«i 

^^s 

^^^■^ 

0 

^^^^ 

n 

^^^ 

0 

^^ 

6 
8 
3 



^V';;^:,-jj\.  i',V,':Vr'^'.v' 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Arciiive 

in  2007  with  funding  from 

IVIicrosoft  Corporation 


http://www.archive.org/details/arnoldtoynbeeOOmontiala 


ARNOLD  TOYNBEE 


ARNOLD  TOYNBEE 
1852-1883 


JOHNS  HOPKINS  UNIVERSITY  STUDIES 

IN 

Historical  and  Political  Science 

HERBERT  B.  ADAMS,  Editor 


History  is  past  Politics  and  Politics  present  History— /reeman 


SEVENTH  SERIES 
I 

ARNOLD  TOYNBEE 


V 


BY  F.  C.  MONTAGUE 

Felloio  qf  Oriel  College,  Or/urd 


With  ah  Accotjkt  of  the  Work  of  Totnbee  Hall  in  East  London, 

BT  Philip  Lyttelton  Gell,  M.  A^  Chairman  of  the  Council. 

Also  an  AccotrNT  of  the  Neighborhood  Guild  in 

New  York,  by  Charles  B.  Stover,  A.  B. 


BALTIMORE 

FtnjLiCATios  Aoexct  of  the  Jouxs  Hopkins  Univkksitt 

JANUARY,   1880 


ov 


COPTKIOBT.  1888.  BT  N.  MuRRAT. 


JOUS  MUKPHT  A  00^  PRI.NTKK8, 
BALTIMOBK. 


ARNOLD   TOYNBEE. 


I. 

Arnold  Toynbee,  the  second  son  of  Joseph  Toynbee,  the 
distinguished  aurist,  was  born  on  the  23rd  of  August,  1852, 
in  Savile  Row,  London.  Whilst  he  was  yet  an  infant,  his 
family  removed  to  a  house  at  Wimbledon  in  Surrey,  where  he 
spent  the  greater  part  of  his  childhood.  Mr.  Toynbee  is 
remembered  by  friends  to  have  taken  the  keenest  interest  in 
Arnold  of  whom,  when  only  four  years  old,  he  spoke  as  his 
child  of  promise,  and  on  whose  development  he  exercised  a 
very  powerful  influence.  He  was  always  anxious  to  improve 
the  condition  of  the  poor,  and  assisted  in  the  erection  of  model 
cottages  and  the  establishment  of  a  lecture  hall  at  Wimbledon. 
He  employed  Arnold  whilst  yet  very  young  in  the  lectures 
upon  elementary  science  which  he  used  to  give  to  the  working- 
men  of  the  neighborhood.  Nor  was  it  only  by  setting  an 
example  of  public  spirit  that  Mr.  Toynbee  did  much  to  form 
the  character  of  his  son.  He  was  a  lover  of  art,  a  discerning 
collector  of  pictures,  who  knew  how  to  communicate  to  others 
his  enthusiasm  for  the  works  of  great  masters,  and  like  all  who 
sincerely  love  art,  he  took  an  especial  delight  in  natural  beauty. 
Wimbledon  was  then  a  pretty  village  situated  in  a  fresh  rural 
landscape,  the  fairest  to  be  found  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of 
London.  In  later  years  Arnold  Toynbee  would  look  back  as 
to  the  happiest  hours  of  childhood  to  those  rambles  over 
Wimbledon  Common  on  which  his  father  would  take  out  a 
volume  of  poetry  and  as  they  rested  in  pleasant  spots  here 

5 


6  Arnold  Toynbee. 

and  there  read  aloud  such  passages  as  a  child  could  feel  at 
least,  if  not  understand. 

Whilst  yet  very  young  Arnold  Toynbee  delighted  in 
reading  history,  especially  military  history,  and  his  favorite 
pastime  was  to  construct  mimic  fortifications,  which  he  built 
with  more  than  childish  precision  and  armed  with  the  heaviest, 
ordnance  procurable.  Always  delicate  and  exquisitely  sensi- 
tive to  pain,  he  had  not  the  animal  courage  common  to  strong, 
healthy  boys;  yet,  by  the  unanimous  testimony  of  brothers 
and  of  schoolfellows,  he  was  singularly  fearless,  throwing 
himself  into  everything  which  he  attempted  with  an  impetu- 
osity which  made  him  forgetful  of  consequences  and  even  of 
actual  suffering.  With  this  high-strung  vehemence  he  united 
a  very  resolute  will.  From  first  to  last,  he  was  one  of  those 
who  would  sooner  be  dashed  to  pieces  than  fail  to  climb  any 
height  which  they  have  once  determined  to  surmount.  In 
later  life  these  qualities  were  tempered  by  scrupulous  anxiety 
to  be  just  and  fair,  by  a  beautiful  kindliness  and  delicacy; 
but  in  early  youth  they  were  accompanied  with  a  violent 
temper,  and  an  excess  of  self-confidence.  He  was  but  eight 
years  old  when  he  went  to  his  first  school,  a  private  establish- 
ment at  Blackheath,  where  he  became  the  leader  in  amusement 
and  mischief  of  boys  much  older  than  himself.  Having  once 
planned  with  many  of  his  schoolfellows  a  joke  to  be  executed 
when  the  master's  back  was  turned,  he  failed  to  notice  the 
entrance  by  an  opposite  door  of  another  master  and  the  hasty 
retreat  of  all  his  accomplices  who  left  him  alone  in  the  middle 
of  the  floor,  absorbed  in  the  execution  of  a  caricature  for  which 
he  alone  suffered,  although  all  were  guilty. 

As  a  schoolboy  and  ever  after  he  was  slow  in  acquiring  a 
knowledge  of  any  subject  distasteful  to  him,  such  as  languages 
or  mathematics,  but  showed  great  power  in  grasping  any  sub- 
ject which,  like  history,  fired  his  imagination.  Rapidity  of 
acquisition  was  never  the  distinguishing  quality  of  his  intelli- 
gence. A  fastidious  taste  and  eager  passion  for  truth  made 
half  knowledge  distasteful  to  him;   and  whole  knowledge 


Ai-nold  Toynbee.  7 

comes  readily  to  no  man.  At  school  he  grew  so  decided  in 
his  preference  for  a  military  life  that,  when  he  was  fourteen 
years  of  age,  his  father  sent  him  to  a  college  which  prepared 
candidates  for  army  examinations.  Here  he  held  his  own 
among  comrades  who  were  not  very  congenial.  He  had  a 
boy's  instinct  for  games  and  his  swiftness  of  foot  and  high 
spirit  made  him  an  excellent  football  player;  but  he  played 
football,  as  he  did  everything  else,  with  an  eagerness  which 
overstrained  his  delicate  nervous  system,  and  in  consequence 
he  suffered  from  illness  and  sleepless  nights.  Here  too  he 
enlarged  his  reading  in  history  and  surprised  his  tutors  by  the 
force  and  originality  of  his  essays.  He  began  to  feel  an 
impulse  towards  purely  intellectual  pursuits  and  an  unfitness 
for  the  career  of  a  soldier.  His  father  was  no  longer  living, 
and,  at  his  own  request,  he  left  the  college  when  he  was  about 
sixteen  years  of  age.  He  had  not  made  many  friends  among 
his  fellow  students,  but  he  had  impressed  the  masters  as  a 
youth  of  singular  talent  and  singular  elevation  of  character; 
so  much  so,  that  one  of  them,  making  him  a  present  on  his 
departure,  asked  him  to  accept  it  as  a  token  "of  real  respect 
and  esteem." 

Having  abandoned  all  thoughts  of  entering  the  army, 
Toynbee  next  thought  of  preparing  himself  to  enter  the 
Civil  Service;  and  with  this  view  spent  the  two  following 
years  in  reading  at  home  and  in  attending  lectures  at  King's 
College,  London.  Subsequently  he  resolved  to  be  called  to 
the  Bar;  a  resolution  which  he  only  abandoned  after  a  pain- 
ful struggle  and  in  obedience  to  circumstances.  These  were 
to  him  years  of  painful  uncertainty.  Although  he  had  many 
who  were  very  dear  to  him,  none  fully  understood,  certainly 
he  did  not  himself  understand  the  tendency  of  that  inward 
restlessness  which  he  seems  to  have  experienced  at  this  period. 
It  is  the  fashion  to  say  that  youth  is  the  happiest  season  of 
life,  and,  in  one  sense,  this  is  true,  but  in  another  sense  it  is 
equally  true,  that  the  youth  of  thoughtful  persons  is  often 
racked  with  pains  which  they  caunot  express  and  which  are 


8  Arnold  Toynbee. 

not  the  less  real,  because  their  elders  can  prescribe  nothing 
l)ettcr  than  platitudes.  The  sufferinjjs  of  middle  and  of  latter 
life  bear  no  more  analogy  to  these  pains  than  does  the  anguish 
of  a  tcK)thache  to  the  torture  of  cutting  one's  teeth.  Whilst 
the  surface-current  of  Toynbee's  mind  set  now  towards  this, 
now  towards  that  profession,  the  undercurrent  set  more  and 
more  steadily  towards  the  pursuit  of  truth.  At  length  that 
current  swept  him  right  away  and  he  deliberately  resolved  to 
devote  his  life  to  the  study  of  history  and  of  the  philosophy 
of  history.  In  order  to  secure  quiet  for  his  meditations, 
Toynbee  took  lodgings,  first,  in  the  village  of  Bracknell  in 
Berks,  and  afterwards  in  the  village  of  East  Lulworth  on  the 
Dorsetshire  coast;  in  these  retreats  he  spent  many  months. 
For  the  first  time  he  began  to  see  what  he  really  wished 
to  do,  and,  still  more  important,  what  it  was  that  he  really 
could  do. 

Toynbee's  aspirations  and  plans  of  study  of  this  period  may 
best  be  gathered  from  a  letter  which  he  wrote  to  the  late  Mr. 
Hinton,  a  warm  friend  of  his  father  and  a  spirit  in  many 
ways  congenial  to  his  own.  It  will  be  necessary  to  refer 
hereafter  to  the  correspondence  in  which  this  letter  occurs. 
It  is  dated  the  18th  of  September,  1871,  when  the  writer  had 
just  completed  his  nineteenth  year  and  was  written  from  East 
Lulworth.  The  passage  relevant  in  this  context  is  as  fol- 
lows : — 

"  For  myself,  I  have,  since  the  beginning  of  April,  with 
the  exception  of  a  short  interval  in  July,  been  reading  alone 
at  this  quiet  little  village  near  the  seacoast,  ostensibly  with  a 
view  to  a  University  career;  but  determined  to  devote  my 
life  and  such  power  as  I  possess  to  the  study  of  the  philosophy 
of  history.  With  this  object  in  view,  I  have  no  inclination  to 
enter  any  profession  ;  nor  do  I  think  it  probable  that  I  shall 
compete  for  a  scholarship  at  the  University.  To  these  pur- 
suits I  wish  to  give  my  whole  life.  The  small  means  at  my 
disposal,  and  those  which  without  the  exj)enditure  of  much 
time  I  hope  to  be  able  to  add  to  them,  will  be  sufficient  for 


Arnold  Toynbee.  9 

my  maintenance.  I  do  not  care  to  spend  my  life  in  acquiring 
material  benefits  which  might  have  an  evil,  and  at  any  rate 
could  not  have  a  good  effect  upon  me.  These  ideas  may  appear 
ridiculous  in  one  so  young  and  of  powers  so  immature,  but 
they  are  not  the  result  of  mere  ambition,  or  of  an  empty  desire 
for  fame  in  itself,  or  for  the  rewards  with  which  it  is  accom- 
panied. My  sole,  and  so  far  as  it  can  be  so,  unalloyed  motive 
is  the  pursuit  of  truth  ;  and  for  truth  I  feel  I  would  willingly 
sacrifice  prospects  of  the  most  dazzling  renown.  I  do  not 
even  think  myself  capable  of  accomplishing  any  work  of 
importance.  If  my  labors  merely  serve  to  assist  another  in 
the  great  cause,  I  shall  be  satisfied." 

As  time  went  on  Toynbee  found  reason  to  vary  the  pro- 
gramme of  work  laid  down  in  this  letter,  but  he  never  swerved 
from  the  spirit  expressed  therein.  Few  men  have  combined  so 
much  self-confidence  with  so  much  modesty,  or  have  been  so 
entirely  absorbed  in  their  work,  so  totally  free  from  motives  of 
vanity  or  of  egotism.  Yet  a  solitary  life  was  neither  natural 
nor  wholesome  for  one  so  young.  At  this  time  he  was  an 
absolute  recluse  in  his  habits,  and  even  when  at  home  shut 
himself  up  with  his  books,  disdaining,  like  so  many  clever 
boys,  to  mix  with  ordinary  society.  Happily,  this  stage  of 
his  life  was  not  to  continue  much  lonsrer.  When  he  had 
reached  the  age  of  twenty -one  years,  he  found  himself  master 
of  a  small  capital,  and  trusting  to  this  for  maintenance  during 
a  university  career,  he  became  a  member  of  Pembroke  College, 
Oxford,  in  the  January  of  1873.  In  the  autumn  of  that  year 
he  resolved  to  compete  for  a  scholarship  in  Modern  History 
at  Balliol  College.  Here  he  was  unsuccessful.  He  had 
brought  up  to  the  University  a  considerable  knowledge  of 
history  and  of  general  literature.  But  he  had  accumulated 
knowledge  in  order  to  satisfy  his  own  cravings,  not  the  curi- 
osity of  examiners.  He  had  accumulated  it  without  advice  or 
assistance,  and  had  never  gone  through  that  singular  process 
whereby  a  lad  who  knows  little  and  cares  nothing  for  knowl- 
edge is  enabled  to  turn  out  dozens  of  tolerably  correct  essays 


10  Arnold  Toynbee, 

upon  dozens  of  great  subjects.  In  short,  he  had  not  read  for 
examination,  and,  when  examined,  could  not  do  himself 
justice. 

From  this  repulse,  however,  Toynbee  derived  a  benefit  impos- 
sible to  estimate  too  highly.  As  he  had  read  and  reflected 
by  himself,  and  had  honestly  worked  out  his  own  opinions, 
he  imagined  himself  to  have  gone  deeper  and  further  than  was 
really  the  case.  Extreme,  therefore,  was  his  disgust  when 
one  of  his  examiners,  in  explaining  to  him  the  reasons  of  his 
ill-success,  said  :  "  You  have  picked  up  your  ideas  from  hear- 
ing the  clever  talk  of  London  society,  and  you  have  written 
your  papers  just  as  you  would  talk."  He  used  afterwards 
to  say  that  this  criticism,  baseless  as  it  was,  had  done  him  the 
greatest  good  imaginable.  It  is  true  that  the  incisive  way  of 
putting  ideas  which  struck  his  examiners  derived  itself  from 
an  incisive  way  of  thinking,  and  continued  with  him  through- 
out life.  But  it  is  also  true  that,  in  the  present  stage  of 
learning,  the  student  who  does  not  avail  himself  of  the  recog- 
nized methods  is  like  a  traveller  who  prefers  his  own  legs  to  an 
express  train.  With  all  their  faults,  the  universities  supply 
to  the  scholar  that  which  he  cannot  dispense  with  and  cannot 
get  so  well  anywhere  else — the  methods  elaborated  by  thous- 
ands of  his  predecessors ;  the  correction  supplied  by  contem- 
poraries equal  or  superior  to  himself;  the  powerful  current  of 
spiritual  electricity  set  up  in  the  assemblage  of  so  mauy  eager 
wits.  Had  Toynbee  never  gone  to  the  University,  he  might 
have  remained  all  his  life  groping  towards  results  long  since 
attained  by  men  far  inferior  in  force  of  character  and  of  intel- 
ligence. His  new  experience  taught  him  his  defects  and  how 
to  amend  them. 

But  the  immediate  result  of  the  scholarship  examination 
was  one  of  those  tedious  illnesses  which  consumed  so  much  of 
the  short  time  allotted  to  him  upon  earth.  He  was  forced  to 
leave  Oxford,  to  suspend  all  his  work,  to  go  down  into  the 
country  and  try  slowly  and  painfully  to  rally  his  exhausted 
{wwers.     From  this  and  many  other  such  intervals  of  mourn- 


Arnold  Toynbee.  11 

fill  leisure  he,  indeed,  drew  profit,  as  such  a  nature  draws  profit 
from  every  experience.  For  his  friends  they  were  an  unmixed 
sadness.  It  was  not  until  a  year  had  passed  away  that  he  was 
able  to  return  to  Oxford.  In  the  January  of  1875  he  became 
a  commoner  of  Balliol  College.  His  real  undergraduate  life 
commences  from  this  date ;  and  here  the  narrative  of  his  early 
years  may  best  conclude. 

II. 

Toynbee's  health  continued  to  be  so  delicate  that  he  could 
not  read  for  honors  in  any  school,  much  less  compete  for  any 
university  prizes  or  distinctions.  As  he  was  unable  to  study 
hard  for  more  than  an  average  of  two  or  three  hours  a  day, 
he  was  obliged  to  content  himself  with  a  pass  degree.  Yet 
few  men  have  derived  more  profit  from  a  university  course. 
He  continued  to  read  widely  and  judiciously.  The  Master 
and  the  tutors  of  Balliol  College  fully  comprehended  his 
great  gifts  and  great  embarrassments,  and  gave  him  sym- 
pathy, guidance  and  frank,  discerning  criticism.  He  always 
gratefully  acknowledged  much  he  owed  especially  to  the 
Master  and  to  the  late  Professor  Thomas  Hill  Green.  As 
regards  his  merely  academic  studies,  it  is  here  enough  to 
say  that  he  took  a  pass  degree  in  the  summer  of  1878. 

Every  one  who  knows  Oxford  will  allow  that,  valuable  as 
is  the  teaching  supplied  by  the  university  and  the  colleges,  it 
is  hardly  more  valuable  than  the  genial  intercourse  between 
the  young  inquisitive  spirits  there  assembled. 

Although  Toynbee  had  hitherto  lived  in  seclusion,  he  fell 
very  readily  into  this  intercourse  and  gave  even  more  good 
than  he  received.  He  was  in  truth  formed  for  society  and 
friendship.  At  this  time  he  was  very  comely  and  attractive 
in  appearance.  An  oval  face,  a  high  forehead  crowned  with 
masses  of  soft  brown  hair,  features  very  clearly  cut,  a  straight 
nose  and  a  rather  large,  full-lipped  mouth,  only  needed  more 
color  to  produce  the  impression  of  beauty ;  and  even  the  color 


12  Arnold  Toynbee. 

wanting  to  his  gray  eyes  and  brown  complexion  was  supplied 
when  he  grew  warm  in  conversation  by  a  lighting  up  of  his 
whole  countenance,  a  brilliant  yet  soft  irradiation,  which 
charraetl  the  beholder  and  can  never  be  forgotten  by  those 
who  knew  hira  well.  Together  with  this  winning  countenance 
he  had  a  manner  singularly  frank,  open  and  animated.  A 
student  and  an  invalid,  he  was  free  from  the  vexatious  oddi- 
ties of  either ;  was  neither  shy  nor  slow  nor  abstracted  nor 
languid,  but  always  prompt  and  lively.  He  talked  extremely 
well,  without  exactly  conversing.  For  that  delightful  pastime 
which  the  French  call  a  causerie  he  was  not  altogether  adapted. 
For  that  the  mind  must  be  habitually  at  ease — not  unemployed, 
but  never  taxed  up  to  its  utmost  strength,  not  strained  by 
crowding  ideas  on  vehement  feelings.  Toynbee,  as  time  went 
on,  came  to  concentrate  more  and  more  upon  a  few  momentous 
subjects  which  were  ever  present  to  him,  concerning  which  he 
spoke  with  wonderful  eloquence  and  enthusiasm.  The  faces 
of  listeners  supplied  him  with  the  stimulus  which  his  sensitive 
temperament  and  weak  body  required.  He  never  was  quite 
happy  in  writing  out  his  thoughts.  He  complained  that  they 
came  upon  his  mind  faster  than  he  could  set  them  down  on 
paper.  That  he  had  real  litei*ary  talent,  many  passages  in  the 
volume  of  fragments  published  after  his  death  show ;  but 
nothing  which  he  has  written  gives  any  idea  of  his  power  of 
expressing  himself  by  word  of  mouth.  Although  he  spoke 
rapidly  and  copiously,  he  never  was  betrayed  into  a  vulgar 
phrase  or  slovenly  construction;  he  spoke  as  one  to  whom 
idiomatic  utterance  is  natural,  correctly  and  forcibly,  without 
the  cant  phrases  of  the  undergraduate  or  the  studied  negli- 
gence of  the  college  tutor.  Nor  did  he,  like  so  many  other 
exuberant  speakers,  suggest  to  those  who  heard  him  that  he 
spoke  out  of  a  passion  for  display.  If  he  talked  much  it  was 
because  he  forgot  himself  in  his  subject.  No  man  ever  was 
more  willing  to  hear  all  that  others  had  to  say,  or  sought  with 
more  kind  and  courteous  attention  to  encourage  criticism,  even 
opposition.     Naturally  combative  and  fond  of  controvei'sy,  he 


Arnold  Toynbee.  13 

was  never  betrayed  into  those  little  breaches  of  amenity  so 
common  even  among  men  of  good  temper  and  good  breeding 
when  heated  by  argument.  Naturally  somewhat  intolerant, 
he  had  schooled  himself  into  genuine  tolerance.  Naturally 
sensitive  and  excitable,  he  had,  whilst  retaining  all  his  original 
warmth,  subdued  in  a  surprising  degree  the  impulse  to  exag- 
gerate. Everj'thing  he  said  bore  the  impress  of  an  exquisitely 
fine  nature.  One  could  not  listen  to  him  without  admiring, 
or  argue  against  him  without  loving.  One  could  no  more 
say  a  brutal  or  profane  thing  to  him  than  to  the  most  delicate 
lady.  Not  that  he  was  finical,  or  censorious,  or  assumed  the 
right  to  check  others  in  an  impertinent  or  condescending  tone, 
but  that  no  man  of  good  feeling  could,  without  a  cutting  pang 
of  remorse,  shock  such  an  exquisite  sensibility. 

Good  looks,  talent,  information  and  social  gifts  are  more 
than  enough  to  gain  friends  at  the  University ;  but  Toynbee 
had  many  other  attractions.  He  was  in  all  senses  of  the  word, 
sympathetic.  He  had  sympathy  for  men's  sufferings,  for  their 
interests  and  pursuits,  even  for  their  failings  and  misdeeds. 
No  matter  what  the  troubles  of  an  acquaintance — ill  health, 
ill  success,  disappointment  or  poverty,  they  always  seeme*^  to 
raise  his  value  in  Toynbee's  eyes.  Nor  was  compassion  with 
Toynbee  a  mere  sentiment.  He  was  always  eager  to  assist  in 
any  useful  way,  studied  his  friend's  affairs  as  if  they  were  his 
own,  gave  the  warmest,  sincerest  encouragement  to  the  de- 
sponding, the  kindest,  tenderest  criticism  to  the  erring,  yet 
seemed  never  to  expect  any  thanks  and  to  take  gratitude  as  a 
free  gift.  Out  of  his  small  store  of  life  and  strength  he 
bestowed  freely  upon  all.  With  this  evangelical  charity  he 
joined  the  widest  sympathy  of  another  kind.  All  fellow  stu- 
dents were  his  brethren.  Their  labors,  their  acquisitions,  their 
successes  were  his.  He  admired  talent  of  all  sorts,  and  rejoiced 
in  all  achievements  which  enriched  the  life  of  the  individual 
or  of  the  race. 

For  a  man  of  this  temperament  the  years  spent  at  college 
are  his  happiest.     The  years  that  come  after  may  bring  the 


14  Arnold  Toynhee. 

philosophic  mind;  but  they  cannot  add  the  joy  and  the  fulness 
of  life,  Toynbee  had  not  hitherto  felt  how  much  he  was  alive; 
he  felt  it  now,  and  was  charmed  with  a  new  sense  of  expansion. 
"The garden  quadrangle  at  Balliol,"  he  writes  to  a  friend,  "is 
where  one  walks  at  night,  and  listens  to  the  wind  in  the  trees, 
and  weaves  the  stars  into  the  web  of  one's  thoughts;  where  one 
gazes  from  the  pale  inhuman  moon  to  the  ruddy  light  of  the 
windows,  and  hears  broken  notes  of  music  and  laughter  and 
the  complaining  murmur  of  the  railroad  in  the  distance.  .  .  . 
The  life  here  is  very  sweet  and  full  of  joy ;  at  Oxford,  after  all, 
one's  ideal  of  happy  life  is  nearer  being  realized  than  anywhere 
else — I  mean  the  ideal  of  gentle,  equable,  intellectual  inter- 
course, with  something  of  a  prophetic  glow  al>out  it,  glancing 
brightly  into  the  future,  yet  always  embalming  itself  in  the 
memory  as  a  resting-place  for  the  soul  in  a  future  that  may 
be  dark  and  troubled  afler  all,  with  little  in  it  but  disastrous 
failure." 

Soon  after  Arnold  Toynbee  came  up  to  Oxford,  Mr. 
Ruskin,  then  Professor  of  Fine  Arts  in  the  University, 
made  a  characteristic  endeavor  to  illustrate  the  dignity  and 
good  eflPects  of  even  the  coarsest  bodily  toil.  He  persuaded 
many  undergraduates  to  work  under  him  at  the  repair  of  a 
road  in  the  village  of  Hinksey  near  Oxford.  Among  these 
undergraduates  was  Toynljee,  who  rose  by  his  zeal  to  the  rank 
of  a  foreman.  He  was  thus  entitled  to  appear  frequently  at 
those  breakfasts  which  Mr.  Ruskin  gave  to  his  young  friends 
and  enlivened  with  quaint,  eloquent  conversation.  Upon  men 
like  Toynbee,  intercourse  with  Mr.  Ruskin  had  a  stimulating 
effect  more  durable  than  the  actual  improvement  of  the  road 
near  Hinksey.  Toynl)ee  came  to  think  very  differently  from 
Mr.  Ruskin  upon  many  subjects,  and  especially  upon  democ- 
racy;  but  always  regarded  him  with  reverence  and  affection. 
AlxMit  the  same  time  Toynbee  joined  the  Oxford  University 
Rifles,  because  he  thought  that  every  man  should  qualify 
himself  to  take  part  in  the  defence  of  his  country;  he  was 
unable,  however,  long  to  fulfil  the  duties  of  a  volunteer. 


Aimold  Toynbee.  15 

His  bodily  weakness,  which  also  forbade  him  to  study  long 
or  with  strict  regularity,  constrained  him,  as  it  were,  to  enjoy 
Oxford  and  its  society  more  than  he  might  otherwise  have 
allowed  himself  to  do.  It  brought  another  indirect  advantage 
of  even  more  consequence.  It  saved  him  from  the  bad  effects 
of  our  fashionable  method  of  intellectual  instruction,  which 
tends  to  make  the  student  read  as  much  and  as  widely  as 
possible  without  any  reference  to  the  effect  which  reading 
may  have  upon  the  mind.  Toynbee  was  naturally  exact  in 
his  intelligence,  and  gained  in  accuracy  and  thoroughness  as 
time  went  on.  He  derived  nothing  but  good  from  his 
studies  as  an  undergraduate.  Older  than  most  under- 
graduates, he  felt  the  genial  influence  of  Oxford,  without 
being  overpowered  by  it.  Without  ceasing  to  be  original  he 
appropriated,  more  freely  than  he  had  ever  done  before,  the 
ideas  of  his  time.  Soon  after  coming  into  residence  at  Balliol 
College,  he  had  decided  to  take  political  economy  for  his  prov- 
ince and  to  study  it  upon  historical  methods.  Political  econ- 
omy attracted  him  chiefly  as  affording  instruction  respecting 
the  conditions  of  social  life,  and  his  interest  in  that  science 
was  singularly  intertwined  with  interest  in  other  subjects,  in 
popular  prejudice  the  most  remote  from  it  of  any. 

Religion  daily  came  to  occupy  his  thoughts  more  and  more. 
In  his  boyhood  it  had  no  very  important  place.  He  had 
received  the  usual  instruction  in  religious  subjects  and  this  had, 
as  usual,  made  very  little  impression.  His  father,  although, 
full  of  religious  feeling,  had  perhaps  wisely  abstained  from 
indoctrinating  his  children  with  any  rigid  creed  or  drilling 
them  in  any  strict  forms  of  worship.  When  Arnold  Toynbee 
had  reached  the  age  at  which  life  first  becomes  serious,  his 
first  aspirations  were,  as  we  have  seen,  purely  intellectual. 
He  wished  to  live  for  others  and  resolved  to  live  for  them  as 
a  student.  An  increase  of  knowledge  was  the  blessing  which 
he  wished  to  confer  upon  his  race.  But  his  early  ideal  was 
not  to  give  him  full  satisfaction.  Even  at  the  age  of  nineteen 
years,  as  is  shown  by  the  correspondence  with  Mr.  Hinton 


16  Arnold  Toynbee, 

above  quote<l,  he  had  begun  to  ponder  the  most  vexing 
problems  which  offer  themselves  to  the  devout  mind.  The 
correspondence  turned  chiefly  upon  Mr.  Hinton's  book  "The 
Mystery  of  Pain."  Mr.  Hinton's  speculative  euthusiasm,  his 
real  elevation  of  mind  and  sympathy  with  religious  cravings 
were  such  as  might  well  fascinate  an  eager  clever  lad  arrived 
at  the  age  when  the  very  few  who  are  not  absorbetl  in  careless 
gaiety  are  so  frequently  devoured  by  ascetic  earnestness.  As 
time  went  on  the  spell  which  Mr.  Hinton  exercised  over 
Arnold  Toynliee  lost  much  of  its  force.  The  young  man 
came  to  see  that  Mr.  Hinton's  remarkable  book  leaves  the 
mystery  as  mysterious  as  it  was  before,  and  felt  perhaps  a 
growing  sense  of  discord  between  his  own  nature  and  that 
of  his  early  teacher.  Their  exchange  of  ideas  nevertheless 
marked  an  epoch  in  Toynbee's  life. 

His  religious  development  was  not  checked  but  accelerated 
by  his  residence  at  Oxford.  "  Most  men,"  he  said,  "  seem  to 
throw  ofl^  their  beliefs  as  they  pass  through  a  University 
career;  I  made  mine."  Just  before  becoming  an  undergradu- 
ate he  had,  of  his  own  accord,  turned  to  the  classics  of  religion 
and  read  them  with  the  eagerness  of  one  who  is  quenching  a 
real  and  painful  thirst.  He  read  the  Bible  so  earnestly  as  to 
draw  from  one  of  his  friends  the  deliciously  naive  remark 
"Toynbee  reads  his  Bible  like  any  other  book — as  if  he  liked 
it."  In  the  course  of  his  first  year  at  Balliol  he  writes  to  a 
friend  :  "  The  two  things  the  Bible  speaks  to  our  hearts  most 
unmistakably  are  the  unfathomable  longing  for  God,  and  the 
forgiveness  of  sins;  and  these  are  the  utterances  that  fill  up 
an  aching  void  in  my  secular  religion — a  religion  which  is 
slowly  breaking  to  pieces  under  me.  It  is  astonishing  to 
think  that  in  the  Bible  itself  we  find  the  most  eloquent  heart- 
rending expression  of  that  doubt  and  utter  darkness  and 
disbelief  which  noisy  rhetoricians  and  calm  sceptics  would 
almost  persuade  us  were  never  before  adequately  expressed — 
they  would  tell  us  we  must  look  for  it  all  in  their  bald  lan- 
guage."    And  a  little  later,  "  A  speechless  thrill  of  spiritual 


Ai^nold  Toynbee.  17 

desire  sometimes  runs  through  me  and  makes  me  hope  even 
when  most  weary."  "As  to  position  in  life,"  he  wrote  about 
the  same  time,  "  the  position  I  wish  to  attain  to  is  that  of  a 
man  consumed  with  the  thirst  after  righteousness." 

As  Toynbee's  religion  had  not  come  to  him  through  the 
medium  of  customary  religious  forms,  or  in  association  with 
accepted  religious  dogmas,  these  dogmas  and  forms  never 
were  to  him  so  momentous  as  they  are  to  many  devout  souls. 
Not  indeed  that  he  was  hostile  to  either.  He  knew  that  the 
practice  of  simple  religious  observances  was  beneficial  to  the 
spiritual  life  of  the  individual  and  necessary  to  the  spiritual 
life  of  the  nation ;  he  joined  in  them  and,  as  time  went  on, 
valued  them  more  highly  than  he  had  done  in  youth.  He 
would  earnestly  seek  out  the  truth  contained  in  accepted 
dogmas;  but  he  could  not  help  seeing  how  mischievous  to 
religion  and  to  civilization  some  of  them  have  proved,  and 
how  inadequate  all  must  necessarily  be.  His  incisive  intelli- 
gence and  historical  feeling  forbade  him  to  dress  his  faith  in 
the  worn  out  garb  of  mediaeval  devotion,  or  to  try  the  spiritual 
discipline  of  believing  what  he  knew  to  be  untrue.  Yet  the 
same  intelligence  and  feeling  forbade  him  to  set  up  an  infin- 
itesimal church  of  his  own  or  to  worship  assiduously  an  ideal 
existing  only  in  his  own  imagination.  He  thought  that  any 
follower  of  Christ  might  live  in  the  Church  of  England.  He 
always  strove  to  find  some  definite  intellectual  conceptions  to 
support  his  faith,  for  he  saw  that  without  such  conceptions 
piety  must  degenerate  into  sentiment.  It  seemed  to  him  that, 
whilst  every  age  and  country,  nay  every  serious  believer,  must 
more  or  less  differ  in  religious  doctrine  from  every  other,  since 
religious  doctrine  is  related  to  the  whole  spiritual,  moral  and 
intellectual  life,  which  is  infinitely  various,  yet  doctrine  of 
some  kind  or  another  is  necessary  in  every  instance,  and  peace 
and  freedom  are  to  be  found,  not  in  luxurious  dreamy  fiction, 
but  in  the  humble  acknowledgment  that  the  best  and  highest 
utterances  of  man  concerning  God  are  inevitably  imperfect, 
incoherent  and  transitory.  Thus  eagerly  searching  to  har- 
2 


18  Arnold  Toynbee. 

monize  the  piety  which  he  had  learned  from  the  Bible,  and 
the  Imitation  of  Thomas  h  Kenipis,  with  those  modern  idtas 
to  which  he  was  etiuully  loyal,  he  found  esi^ecial  hel|>  in  the 
teaching  and  conversation  ol"  the  late  Professor  Green,  whose 
lay  sermons  delivered  in  Balliol  College  made  a  memorable 
impression  upon  many  who  heard  them.  Professor  Green 
united  the  critical  temper  of  a  German  philosopher  with  the 
fervor  of  a  Puritan  siiint.  Between  him  and  Toynbee  there 
was  an  entire  confidence  and  an  intimate  intellectual  and 
spiritual  communion  which  only  death  interrupted. 

It  would  not  be  right  here  to  set  out  a  body  of  doctrine 
with  Toynbee's  name  attached  to  it.  He  was  ever  feeling  his 
way,  seriving  after  truth,  without  arrogance,  but  with  the 
honest  resolution  not  to  accept  propositions  merely  because 
they  flattered  his  higher  sentiments.  His  nearest  friends 
caught  from  his  conversation,  and  still  more  from  his  daily 
life,  a  bright  reflection  of  his  inward  fire ;  but  none  probably 
would  venture  to  catalogue  his  beliefs.  It  will  be  better  to 
try  to  gather  from  his  own  words  what  he  really  thought, 
always  remembering  that  he  was  very  young  and  oppressed 
by  the  immensity  of  religious  conceptions.  The  following 
passage  occurs  in  a  letter  written  to  an  old  schoolfellow  who 
had  become  an  officer  and  was  then  serving  in  the  Indian 
Army.  The  letter  is  dated  the  2nd  of  October,  1875,  the  first 
year  of  his  residence  at  Balliol  College  : 

"  *  To  love  God  ' — those  words  gather  amazing  force  as  life 
gets  more  difficult,  mysterious  and  unfathomable ;  one's  soul 
in  its  loneliness  at  last  finds  religion  the  only  clue.  And  yet 
how  weary  is  the  search  for  G(xl  among  the  superstitions, 
antiquities,  contradictions  and  grossness  of  popular  religion  • 
but  gleams  of  divinity  are  everywhere,  and  slowly  in  the  end 
comes  divine  j)eace.  ...  It  seems  to  me  that  the  primary 
element  of  all  religion  is  the  faith  that  the  end  for  which  the 
whole  universe  of  sense  and  thought  from  the  Milky  Way  to 
the  lowest  form  of  animal  life,  the  end  for  which  everything 
came  into  existence,  is  that  the  dim  idea  of  perfect  holiness 


Ai'nold  Toynhee.  19 

which  is  found  in  the  mind  of  man  might  be  realized ;  that 
this  idea  is  God  Eternal  and  the  only  reality;  that  the  relation 
between  this  idea  which  is  God  and  each  individual  is  religion, 
the  consciousness  of  the  relation  creating  the  duty  of  perfect 
purity  of  inner  life  or  being,  and  the  duty  of  living  for  others, 
that  they  too  may  be  perfectly  pure  in  thought  and  action ; 
and,  lastly,  that  the  world  is  so  ordered  that  the  triumph  of 
righteousness  is  not  impossible  through  the  efforts  of  the  indi- 
vidual will  in  relation  to  eternal  existence.  I  speak  of  God 
as  an  idea  and  not  as  personal ;  I  think  you  will  understand 
what  1  mean  if  you  ask  yourself  if  the  pure  love  and  thoughts 
of  a  man  are  not  all  that  makes  his  personality  clear  to  you — 
whether  you  would  care  that  anything  else  of  him  should  be 
immortal ;  whether  you  do  not  think  of  all  else  of  him  as  the 
mere  expression  and  symbol  of  his  eternal,  invisible  existence. 
My  dear  fellow,  don't  think  it  strange  that  I  send  you  these 
bare,  abstract  thoughts  all  those  dizzy  leagues  to  India.  I 
only  want  to  tell  you  what  I  am  thinking  of;  do  not  take 
heed  of  them  except  in  so  far  as  they  chime  harmoniously  MMth 
your  own  belief;  I  think  they  are  the  truth,  but  truth  comes 
to  every  mind  so  differently  that  very  ie\N  can  find  the  longed- 
for  unity  except  in  love." 

From  the  passage  just  quoted  the  reader  might  draw  an 
inference  which  it  does  not  justify.  Toynbee  was  perfectly 
well  aware  that  a  Divinity  who  is  nothing  more  than  an 
abstraction  has  never  been  and  never  can  be  the  object  of  a 
real,  living  religion.  Concerning  the  creed  of  the  Positiv- 
ists,  whose  virtues  he  honored,  he  wrote  some  years  later. 
"Humanity  is  really  an  abstraction  manufactured  by  the  intel- 
lect; it  can  never  be  an  object  of  religion,  for  religion  in  every 
form  demands  something  that  lives  and  is  not  made.  It  is 
the  vision  of  a  living  thing  that  makes  the  Psalmist  cry  'As 
the  hart  panteth  after  the  water-brooks,  so  longeth  my  soul 
after  thee,  the  living  God.' "  The  following  words  quoted 
from  an  address  upon  the  ideal  relations  of  Church  and  State, 
may  remove  some  doubts  as  to  his  own  position  : 


20  Arnold  Toynbee. 

"  God  is  a  person — ^how  else  could  man  love  and  worship 
God  ?  What  {)ersonality  is,  we  only  faintly  apprehend — who 
has  withdrawn  the  impenetrable  veil  which  hides  our  own 
personality  from  us?  God  is  a  father — but  who  has  explained 
a  father's  love?  There  is  limitation  to  man's  knowledge,  and 
he  is  disposed  to  cry  out,  Why  this  impassable  barrier?  He 
knows  he  is  limited — why  he  is  limited  he  knows  not.  Only 
by  some  image  does  he  strive  to  approach  the  mystery.  The 
sea,  he  may  say,  had  no  voice  until  it  ceased  to  be  supreme  on 
the  globe.  There,  where  its  dominion  ended  and  its  limits 
began,  on  the  edge  of  the  land,  it  broke  silence.  Man  would 
have  had  no  tongue  had  he  been  merely  infinite.  Where  he 
feels  his  limits,  where  the  infinite  spirit  within  him  touches 
the  shore  of  his  finite  life,  there  he,  too,  breaks  silence." 

On  the  other  hand,  all  notions  of  a  special  Providence 
favoring  this  or  that  race,  this  or  that  individual,  were  shock- 
ing to  Toynbee's  moral  and  religious  feelings.  Nothing 
scandalized  him  more  than  the  self-congratulation  so  often 
uttered  by  serious  people  on  the  occasion  of  their  escape  from 
the  plagues  and  miseries  which  visit  others.  Miracles  do  not 
seem  to  have  been  felt  by  him  as  aids  to  the  belief  in  God. 
The  strangest  of  these  supposed  irregularities  appeared  to  him 
less  divine  than  the  order  and  harmony  of  the  universe.  He 
might  have  chosen  to  express  his  feeling  of  the  presence  of 
God  in  the  words  of  one  of  his  favorite  poets : 

"  A  sense 
Of  something,  far  more  deeply  interfused, 
V/hose  dwelling  is  the  light  of  setting  suns, 
And  the  round  ocean,  and  the  living  air, 
And  the  blue  sky,  and  in  the  mind  of  man 
A  motion  and  a  spirit  that  impels 
All  thinking  things,  all  objects  of  all  thought, 
And  rolls  through  all  things." 

Not  that  his  creed  was  pantheism,  if  by  pantheism  we  mean 
merely  a  vague  awe  or  admiration  inspired  by  the  mighty  sura 
of  existence.     To  him,  as  we  have  seen,  God  was  a  spirit,  a 


Arnold  Toyiibce.  21- 

person  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word.  For  him  religion  was 
insei>arably  bound  up  with  cxjuduct  and  with  righteousness. 
"If  I  did  not  believe  that  the  moral  law  was  eternal,"  he 
once  said,  "  I  should  die."  But  he  felt  irresistibly  impelled 
to  struggle  out  of  the  dualism  which  contents  the  multitude. 

From  weakness  of  imagination  most  religious  people  regard 
the  visible  world  as  something  external  to  God,  and  related  to 
Him  only  as  a  picture  is  related  to  the  painter  or  as  a  king- 
dom is  related  to  its  sovereign.  They  find  something  reassur- 
ing and  comforting  in  direct  exertions  of  the  Divine  preroga- 
tive. As  the  inexplicable  is  for  them  the  sacred,  every 
expansion  of  their  knowledge  is  a  contraction  of  their  faith. 
Most  touching  it  is  to  hear  them  say.  Ah !  there  are  many 
things  for  which  the  men  of  science  cannot  account,  many 
things  which  show  that  there  must  be  a  God.  Most  strange 
is  their  reluctant  conviction  that,  in  so  far  as  the  universe  can 
be  shown  to  be  rational,  it  is  proved  to  have  no  soul.  Their 
frame  of  mind  was  quite  impossible  to  Toynbee,  who  believed 
in  science  as  he  believed  in  God.  He  saw  that  the  so-called 
conflict  of  religion  and  science  really  grows  out  of  two  intel- 
lectual infirmities  common — the  one  among  the  devout  multi- 
tude, the  other  among  students  of  particular  physical  sciences. 
On  the  one  hand,  religious  experiences  have  been  almost 
inseimrably  associated  in  the  popular  mind  with  the  belief 
in  certain  historical  statements,  which,  whether  true  or  false, 
must  be  tried  by  the  critical  canons  applicable  to  all  state- 
ments of  that  kind.  On  the  other  hand,  absorption  in  the 
pursuit  of  physical  science  often  leads  men  to  forget  that  such 
science  can  give  no  ultimate  explanation  of  anything,  because 
it  always  postulates  certain  conceptions  which  it  does  not 
criticise.  For  facts  of  geology  or  biology  we  must  always 
have  recourse  to  geologists  or  to  biologists,  not  because  they 
know  everything  but  because  they  alone  can  know  anything 
relating  to  these  sciences.  On  the  other  hand,  neither  the 
geolc^ist  nor  the  biologist,  as  such,  can  give  the  ultimate 
interpretation  to  be  put  upon  all  facts  whatsoever.    Free  from 


22  Arnold  Toynbee, 

these  contending  prejudices,  Toynbee  always  felt  sure  that  the 
progress  of  criticism  must  end,  not  in  destroying  religion,  but 
in  purifying  religion  from  all  that  is  not  essential.  Of  the 
great  Christian  ideas  he  wrote :  "  They  are  not  the  creations 
of  a  particular  hour  and  place,  they  are  universal,  but  they 
became  a  compelling  power  owing  to  the  inspiration  of  one 
teacher  in  a  particular  comer  of  the  earth.  What  the  real 
character  of  Christ  was,  what  is  the  truth  about  certain  inci- 
dents of  his  life,  we  may  never  ascertain,  but  the  ideal  Christ, 
the  creation  of  centuries  of  Christian  suffering  and  devotion, 
will  be  as  little  affected  by  historical  scepticism  as  the  charac- 
ter of  Shakespeare's  Hamlet  by  researches  into  the  Danish 
chronicles.  Prove  to-morrow  that  the  Scripture  records  and 
the  Christian  tradition  are  inventions  and  you  would  no  more 
destroy  their  influence  as  a  delineation  of  the  spiritual  life 
than  the  critics  destroyed  the  spell  of  the  Homeric  poems  by 
proving  that  Hector  and  Achilles  never  fought  on  the  plains 
of  Troy.  This  may  seem  a  paradox,  but  the  time  will  come 
when  we  shall  no  more  think  it  necessary  to  agree  with  those 
who  assert  that  Christianity  must  stand  or  fall  with  the 
resurrection  of  Christ  than  we  now  dream  of  saying  with  St. 
Bernard  that  it  must  stand  or  fall  with  belief  in  the  Virgin 
Mary.  The  Christian  records  and  the  lives  of  the  sainta  will 
be  indispensable  instruments  for  the  cleansing  of  the  spiritual 
vision,  and  the  power  which  they  exercise  will  be  increased  as 
their  true  value  as  evidence  is  understood.  The  Christian 
religion  itself  will  in  future  rest  upon  a  correct  interpretation 
of  man's  spiritual  character." 

Toynbee  was  well  aware  of  the  spiritual  languor  which  has 
been  among  the  immediate  results  of  the  extraordinary  growth 
of  physical  science  in  our  own  age.  He  had  none  the  less  a 
steadfast  assurance  that  religion  must  in  the  end  gain  strength 
from  the  increase  of  knowledge.  The  following  passage  from 
an  unpublished  essay  shows  with  what  confidence  he  awaited 
the  issue  of  that  revolution  in  thought  which  has  terrified  so 
many  good  people : — 


Arnold  Toymbee.  23 

"  Most  terrible  is  the  effect  of  the  Reign  of  Law  on  the 
belief  in  immortality.  Fever  and  despair  come  upon  action, 
and  the  assertion  that  this  world  is  all  in  all,  narrows  and 
perverts  the  world  of  ethical  science.  And,  indeed,  it  is  very 
awful,  that  great  contrast  of  the  Divine  Fate  of  the  world 
pacing  on  resistless  and  merciless,  and  our  passionate  indi- 
viduality with  its  hopes  and  loves,  and  fears;  that  vision  of 
our  warm  throbbing  personal  life  quenched  for  ever  in  the 
stern  sweep  of  Time.  But  it  is  but  a  passing  picture  of  the 
mind;  soon  the  great  thought  dawns  upon  the  soul,  ^It  is 
I,  this  living,  feeling  man,  that  thinks  of  fate  and  oblivion ; 
I  cannot  reach  the  stars  with  my  hands,  but  I  pierce  beyond 
them  with  my  thoughts,  and  if  things  go  on  in  the  illimitable 
depth  of  the  skies  which  would  shrivel  up  the  imagination 
like  a  dead  leaf,  I  am  greater  than  they,  for  I  ask  "  why " 
and  look  before  and  after,  and  draw  all  things  into  the  tumult 
of  my  personal  life — the  stars  in  their  courses,  and  the  whole 
past  and  future  of  the  universe,  all  things  as  they  move  in 
their  eternal  paths,  even  as  the  tiniest  pool  reflects  the  sun 
and  the  everlasting  hills.' 

"  Like  all  great  intellectual  revolutions,  the  effect  of  the 
Reign  of  Law  upon  ethical  temper  has  been  harassing  and 
disturbing;  but  as  every  great  intellectual  movement  has  in 
the  end  raised  and  ennobled  the  moral  character  of  man 
through  the  purification  of  his  beliefs,  so  will  this  great  con- 
ception leave  us  the  belief  in  God  and  the  belief  in  immor- 
tality purified  and  elevated,  strengthening  through  them  the 
spirit  of  unselfishness  which  it  is  already  beginning  to  inten- 
sify, and  which  makes  us  turn  our  faces  to  the  future  with 
an  ever-growing  hope." 

Religion  was  the  inspiring  force  of  Toynbee's  later  years 
and  his  efforts  to  understand  and  contribute  to  the  cure  of 
social  evils  were  prompted  above  all  by  the  hope  of  raising 
the  people  to  that  degree  of  civilization  in  which  a  pure  and 
rational  religion  would  be  possible  to  them.  Sensitive  to 
their  physical  sufferings  he  was  in  a  degree  which  at  times 


24  Arnold  Toynbee, 

almost  overpowered  his  judgment;  but  he  never  imagined 
that  the  franchise,  regular  employment  at  fair  wages  and 
cheap  necessaries  were  in  themselves  capable  of  appeasing 
the  tremendous  cravings  of  human  nature,  of  quieting  the 
animal  appetites  or  of  satisfying  the  nobler  aspirations.  He 
did  perceive,  however,  that  a  great  number  of  our  people  live 
in  such  a  manner  as  to  make  materialism  and  fanaticism 
almost  unavoidable  alternatives  for  them.  Having  found 
religion  for  himself  and  being  eager  to  help  others  to  find  it 
he  did  not  immediately  become  a  missionary.  He  would 
speak  frankly  of  religion  to  those  who  appeared  to  him  really 
concerned  about  it ;  and  he  hoped  that  at  some  future  time 
he  might  find  a  way  of  preaching  to  the  people.  But  it  was 
not  in  his  nature  to  be  loquacious  about  spiritual  matters  and 
he  was  fond  of  quoting  Bacon's  saying :  "  The  greatest  of 
itlieists  are  the  hypocrites;  for  they  handle  sacred  things 
without  feeling  them." 

Toynbee's  desire  to  understand  and  help  the  poor  led  him  to 
spend  part  of  the  vacations  of  1 875  in  Whitechapel.  Already 
he  had  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that  mere  pecuniary  assist- 
ance unaccompanied  by  knowledge  and  sympathy  is  not 
enough  to  bring  about  any  lasting  change  for  the  better  in 
their  condition.  But  such  knowledge  and  sympathy,  he  saw, 
can  only  grow  out  of  long  and  familiar  intercourse,  in  which 
both  parties  meet  as  nearly  on  an  equality  as  the  facts  of  the 
case  will  allow.  Acting  upon  these  beliefs  he  took  rooms  in 
a  common  lodging  house  in  the  Commercial  Road,  White- 
chapel, and  furnished  them  in  the  barest  possible  manner. 
He  cordially  enlisted  himself  in  the  endeavors  made  by  the 
good  people  there  to  assist  their  neighbors.  He  always  was 
well  aware  of  the  value  of  existing  organizations,  of  the  fact 
that  the  worst  use  which  can  be  made  of  an  institution  is  to 
destroy  it.  He  would  have  endorsed  that  fine  saying  of 
Burke:  "Wisdom  cannot  create  materials;  her  pride  is  in 
their  use."  He  put  himself  at  the  disposal  of  the  Reverend 
Mr.  Barnett,  the  Vicar  of  St.  Jude's,  and  entered  with  zest 


Arnold  Toynbee,  25 

into  all  the  little  feasts  and  amusements  of  the  school  children 
and  their  teachers.  He  also  worked  under  the  Charity  Or- 
ganization Society,  and  particularly  valued  this  employment 
as  giving  an  incojoparable  insight  into  the  real  condition  of 
those  who  are  so  much  talked  about  and  so  little  known.  He 
also  joined  the  Tower  Hamlets  Radical  Club  and  spent  many 
an  evening  there,  trying  to  appreciate  the  ideas  of  East  End 
politicians.  Finding  that  many  members  of  the  club  enter- 
tained especially  strong  prejudices  upon  the  subjects  of  religion 
and  of  political  economy,  he  chose  these  for  his  subjects  when 
asked  to  address  the  club.  In  giving  the  address  upon  reli- 
gion he  discovered  in  himself  a  new  power.  Although  he  had 
not  had  any  previous  experience  and  had  not  elaborated  his 
discourse  beforehand,  he  spoke  eagerly,  clearly  and  contin- 
uously for  nearly  three-quarters  of  an  hour  and  succeeded  in 
fixing  the  attention  of  his  hearers.  He  was  thus  led  to  the 
conclusion  that  speaking  rather  than  writing  would  be  the 
best  medium  for  his  ideas,  and  resolved  to  repeat  the  experi- 
ment as  often  as  time  and  strength  would  allow.  In  sub- 
stance, this  address  was  an  attempt  to  express,  freed  from 
accretions,  the  essence  of  religion,  the  thoughts  and  feelings 
common  to  the  saints  of  all  creeds  and  of  all  ages.  When  he 
sat  down  there  followed  a  debate,  more  lively  than  orthodox 
in  tone.  One  orator^  in  particular  derided  the  common  con- 
ception of  heaven  as  a  place  where  the  angels  have  nothing 
to  do  but  to  let  their  hair  go  on  growing  and  growing  for 
ever.  His  indefatigable  industry,  the  noisy  situation  of  his 
lodgings,  the  extreme  dullness  and  dreariness  of  the  east  end 
of  London,  and,  most  of  all,  the  constant  spectacle  of  so  much 
evil,  so  difficult,  I  will  not  say  of  cure,  but  of  mitigation, 
made  residence  in  Whitechapel  too  exhausting  for  Toynbee's 
delicate  constitution.  He  never  found  fault  with  anything, 
and  stuck  to  his  post  as  long  as  he  could.  But  he  was  at 
length  forced  to  give  up  his  experiment.  Although  he  was 
never  able  to  repeat  it,  it  confirmed  him  in  the  belief  that 
the  prosperous  must  know  before  they  can  really  assist  the 


26  .Arnold  Toynbee, 

poor ;  and  he  was  fond  of  insisting  that  thought  and  knowl- 
edge must  now  in  philanthropy  take  the  place  of  feeling. 
His  example  and  teaching  in  this  matter  have  resulted  in  the 
foundation  of  Toynbee  Hall  in  Whitechapel,  the  inmates  of 
which  are  enabled,  without  forsaking  their  own  friends  or 
pursuits,  to  live  among  those  whom  they  wish  to  benefit. 

Whilst  thus  busied  with  many  things,  Toynbee  contrived  to 
find  delicious  intervals  of  rest.  He  was  a  keen  lover  of  the 
country.  His  naturally  high  spirits  became  almost  boisterous 
in  its  pure  air.  Once  or  twice  every  year  he  escapes!  to  some 
charming  place,  where  with  one  or  two  friends  and  a  few 
favorite  books  he  revelled  in  pleasures  that  needed  not  to  bor- 
row from  luxury.  He  preferred  to  all  other  beautiful  districts 
that  of  the  Lakes,  endeared  to  him  by  memories  of  rambles 
enjoyed  there  in  boyhood  and  by  association  with  Words- 
worth's poems.  He  was  peculiarly  sensitive  to  all  charms  of 
association.  Beauty  was  to  him  rather  suggestive  than  satis- 
fying. He  looked  out  upon  the  world  with  the  eyes  of  a 
philosopher  rather  than  that  of  an  artist.  In  the  National 
Gallery,  one  of  his  favorite  haunts,  he  was  fascinated  less  by 
revelations  of  perfect  form  and  color  than  by  the  austere  grace 
and  pathos  of  such  a  painter  as  Francia.  He  was  especially 
fascinated  by  the  face  of  one  of  the  angels  in  Francia's  picture 
of  the  Entombment.  "  Shall  I  tell  you  to  what  I  liken  it?  " 
he  writes  in  a  letter.  "  Have  you  on  a  still  summer  evening 
ever  heard  far-oif  happy  human  voices,  and  yet  felt  them  to 
be  sad  because  far-off?  In  this  angel's  face  there  is  that 
happy  tone,  but  so  distant  that  you  feel  it  is  also  sad.  Have 
you  ever,  when  the  raindrops  are  pattering  softly  on  the  leaves, 
heard  the  sweet,  low  song  of  birds  ?  In  that  angel's  face  are 
joy  and  sadness  thus  mingled."  His  travels  in  Italy  in  the 
year  1877  were  to  him  full  of  interest  and  enjoyment;  but 
Italy  does  not  seem  to  have  become  dear  to  him  ;  her  art  and 
her  climate  were  perhaps  felt  by  him  as  oppressively  splendid ; 
her  sunny  magnificence  was  not  congenial  to  a  temperament  in 
its  depths  so  full  of  seriousness. 


Arnold  Toynbee,  27 

He  was  a  very  accurate  observer  of  outward  things,  and  in 
his  letters  or  conversation  would  reproduce  with  a  fine  touch 
the  features  of  a  remarkable  landscape.  He  had  leai'nt  much 
from  Mr.  Ruskin's  extraordinary  descriptions  of  nature,  but 
both  by  reading  and  by  experiments  of  his  own,  had  become 
convinced  that  the  pictorial  powers  of  language  are  narrowly 
limited.  He  saw  that  the  mania  for  word-painting  has  for 
the  most  part  resulted  in  verbosity,  confusion  and  weakness. 
Writing  to  a  friend,  he  observes : 

"  The  best  pieces  of  description  are  little  bits  of  incidental 
observation.  The  worst  are  those  interminable  pages  of  mere 
word-daubing,  which  even  Ruskin  is  not  guiltless  of.  When 
you  look  for  topographical  accuracy,  you  are  utterly  disap- 
pointed. Since  my  interest  in  surface  geology  and  physical 
geography  has  been  sharpened  by  the  study  of  political  econ- 
omy, I  have  looked  out  for  plain  facts  in  these  fine  rhapsodies, 
and  have  found  them  as  useless  as  the  purple  mountains  and 
luxuriant  foregrounds  of  a  conventional  landscape.  The  fact 
is,  a  man  must  do  one  of  two  things.  Either  give  a  strict 
topographical  account  of  a  place,  noting  down  relative  heights 
and  distances,  conformation  of  the  rocks,  character  of  the  veg- 
etation, in  such  a  way  that  you  can  piece  the  details  together 
into  an  accurate  outline ;  or  he  must  generalize  his  description, 
carefully  eliininating  all  local  details  and  retaining  only  the 
general  effect  of  the  scene  on  his  mind  at  the  time.  The  great- 
est poets  do  the  last ;  if  you  turn  to  the  Allegro  and  Penseroso 
of  Milton,  you  will  be  struck  by  the  vividness  of  every  touch 
and  the  absence  of  any  attempt  to  picture  an  actual  scene.  In 
most  modern  descriptions  there  is  a  mixture  of  both  kinds. 
You  will  find  plenty  of  vague,  often  exaggerated  expressions, 
confused  by  little  pieces  of  irrelevant  local  detail  which  tease 
the  imagination ;  they  tell  you  a  rose  tree  grew  on  the  right 
side  of  the  door,  yet  never  give  the  slightest  chance  of  placing 
yourself  in  the  scene." 

Unlike  most  travellers  who,  if  they  care  for  anything,  care 
only  for  the  picturesque,  Toynbee  was  insatiable  of  informa- 


^  Ai'notd.  2byn6ec. 

tion  respecting  the  condition  and  way  of  thinking  of  the 
people  amongst  whom  he  travelled.  So  frank  and  cordial 
was  he  in  his  conversation  with  all  sorts  of  men  that  all  readily 
opened  their  minds  to  him.  It  is  true  that  they  took  pains  to 
show  him  as  little  as  they  could  of  their  meanness  or  trivi- 
ality, and  it  is  probable  that  he,  quick  and  eager  as  he  was, 
sometimes  read  into  their  words  thoughts  which  were  not 
clearly  there.  Yet  from  this  personal  intercourse  Toynbee 
derived  knowledge  which  he  could  not  have  so  well  acquired 
in  any  other  way.  Young  as  he  was,  and  almost  overpowered 
by  his  feelings  of  benevolence  and  sympathy,  he  yet  knew  a 
great  deal  concerning  the  classes  for  whom  he  labored.  In 
this  respect  he  differed  much  from  many  good  men  of  our 
own  generation. 

Indeed,  notwithstanding  his  warm  and  enthusiastic  devo- 
tion to  the  ideal  and  his  indifference  to  the  honors  and  rewards 
so  highly  valued  by  most  of  us,  Arnold  Toynbee  had  a  great 
deal  of  common  sense.  He  understood  that  if  we  cannot  live 
by  bread  alone,  neither  can  we  subsist  solely  on  nectar  and 
ambrosia.  One  example  of  the  prudence  which  he  exercised, 
at  least  in  counselling  others  if  not  always  for  himself,  may 
be  quoted  here.  A  younger  brother,  having  gone  into  busi- 
ness in  the  City,  was  oppressed  with  a  growing  distaste  for 
his  work  and  for  his  companions.  He  began  to  think 
seriously  of  choosing  another  walk  in  life,  and  took  counsel 
witli  Arnold.     Arnold,  in  reply,  wrote  as  follows : 

"I  am  very  sorry  you  are  so  disappointed  with  your  work. 
What  you  say  about  the  habits  aud  tastes  of  business  men  is, 
no  doubt,  true ;  but  don't  imagine  that  other  classes  are  very 
different.  If  you  came  liere  and  went  to  a  small  college,  you 
would  find  that  the  tastes  and  habits  of  the  majority  of  under- 
graduates were  much  the  same  as  the  tastes  and  habits  of 
clerks  in  the  City.  I  say  a  small  college,  because  in  large 
colleges,  where  you  have  greater  numbers  to  choose  from,  you 
would  find  a  certain  number  like  yourself,  who  care  for  refine- 


Arnold  Toynbee.  29 

ment  and  dislike  coarseness :  but  you  would  have  to  pick 
them  out.  Remember,  refinement  is  not  common.  In  no 
occupation  which  you  wished  to  adopt  would  you  find  the 
ways  and  opinions  of  your  fellows,  or  most  of  them,  those 
which  you  have  been  brought  up  to  seek  and  approve.  Don't 
misunderstand  me.  All  I  mean  to  say  is,  human  nature  in 
the  City  is  much  like  human  nature  in  the  University.  The 
passions  of  men  who  cast  up  accounts  and  buy  and  sell  tea  are 
not  very  unlike  the  passions  of  men  who  study  Plato  and 
struggle  for  University  distinctions.  Whatever  work  you 
undertake,  you  must  expect  to  have  to  do  with  coarse  men 
who  pursue  low  aims.  You  will,  perhaps,  answer :  '  But  in 
this  case  there  is  literally  not  a  single  pereon  I  care  for  or  can 
make  my  friend.  In  another  occupation  there  would,  at  least, 
be  one  or  two  men  I  could  like.' 

"Granting  this,  let  me  advise  you  on  one  point — don't  think 
of  throwing  up  your  present  work,  until  you  see  quite  clearly 
what  other  work  there  is  you  can  do  which  will  suit  you  bet- 
ter and  enable  you  to  make  a  livelihood.  Look  about,  make 
enquiries,  but  don't  allow  yourself  to  change  until  you  have 
fixed  on  some  new  line  and  fixed  it  after  fullest  consideration 
of  all  you  will  have  to  face. 

"  People  who  have  no  decided  bent  for  any  one  thing, 
naturally  think  that  whatever  they  undertake  is  not  the  work 
they  are  best  fitted  for ;  this  is  true  of  a  great  many  peoj)le. 
If  you  can  point  to  anything  you  would  like  to  do  better  than 
anything  else — I  should  say,  do  it  at  once,  if  you  can  get  a 
livelihood  by  it.  As  it  is,  I  say,  wait,  be  patient,  make  the 
best  of  your  work,  and  be  glad  you  have  the  refinement  you 
miss  in  other  people. 

"There — I  hope  you  don't  think  I  am  harsh.  I  know 
your  position  is  difficult,  is  unpleasant — but  I  don't  see  how 
it  can  be  altered  yet,  and  therefore  I  advise  you  to  do  what  I 
am  sure  you  can  do— make  the  best  of  it. 

"  Ever  your  loving  brother, 

"A.  Toynbee." 


30  Arnold  Toynbee. 

The  author  of  this  wise  and  sententious  letter  had  said  in 
one  written  some  time  before,  "As  a  rule  we  find  our  friends 
and  counsellors  anywhere  but  in  our  own  family."  The  say- 
ing, although  a  hard  one,  is  true ;  and  the  explanation  given 
is  ingenious.  "  We  are  so  near  and  so  alike  in  many  things, 
we  brothers  and  sisters,  that  in  certain  details  we  have  a  more 
intimate  knowledge  of  each  other's  characters  than  our  dearest 
friends.  We  know  the  secret  of  every  little  harsh  accent  or 
selfish  gesture;  words  that  seem  harmless  to  others  are  to  us 
full  of  painful  meaning  because  we  know  too  well  in  our- 
selves the  innermost  folds  of  the  faults  they  exprsss.  There 
is  nothing  we  hate  more  than  our  own  faults  in  others ;  that 
is  the  reason  why  so  many  brothers  are  in  perpetual  feud,  why 
so  many  sisters  are  nothing  to  each  other,  why  whole  families 
live  estranged.  And  yet  it  is  equally  obvious  that  a  chance 
acquaintance  often  judges  us  more  fairly  tlian  our  own  nearest 
relations,  because  these  details  worked  into  prominence  by  the 
trying  friction  of  ev^eryday  life,  are  after  all  only  a  very  small 
part  of  us  which  our  relations  rarely  see  in  perspective.  That 
is  the  reason.  Though  near  in  some  ways,  we  are  never  far 
enough  off.  We  never  see  each  other's  characters  in  propor- 
tion, as  wholes." 

III. 

Having  taken  his  degree,  Toynbee  had  next  to  consider 
how  he  should  secure  a  livelihood.  He  had  come  up  to 
Oxford  without  definite  prospects  and  during  his  stay  there 
had  become  more  and  more  unwilling  to  adopt  any  of  the 
ordinary  professions.  He  had  not  gained  those  distinctions 
or  accumulated  that  sort  of  knowledge  which  may  lie  said  to 
ensure  election  to  a  fellowship.  He  had,  however,  impressed 
the  authorities  of  Balliol  College  with  his  rare  gifts  of  talent 
and  character;  and  by  them  he  was  appointed  tutor  to  the 
students  at  that  college  who  were  qualifying  themselves  for 
the  Indian  Civil  Service.     The  performance  of  the  duties 


Arnold  Toynbee.  31 

attached  to  his  post  left  him  a  good  deal  of  leisure  in  which 
to  prosecute  his  favorite  studies.  The  stijjend  was  not  large, 
but  he  was  a  man  of  few  wants  and  always  held  simplicity  of 
life  to  be  a  sacred  duty.  He  was  not  without  desires,  but 
they  were  impersonal,  and  besides  were  under  the  control  of  a 
strong  will.  Always  delicate  and  often  suffering  from  severe 
illness,  he  had  never  acquired  the  habit  of  petting  himself. 
He  had  retained  all  the  manliness  which  we  usually  fancy 
inseparable  from  robust  health.  Yet,  whilst  thus  severe 
towards  himself,  he  was  indulgent  to  others,  generous,  spirited 
and  quite  free  from  those  boorish  or  cynical  oddities  which 
have  so  often  deformed  the  appearance  and  conversation  of 
men  distinguished  by  unworldliness.  In  his  countenance,  in 
his  words,  in  his  tastes,  in  his  actions,  there  was  a  distinction 
and  an  elegance  which  preserved  his  simplicity  from  plain- 
ness. There  was  something  in  his  presence  which  checked 
impertinence  and  frightened  vulgarity. 

Had  Arnold  Toynbee  lived  in  the  thirteenth  century,  he 
would  probably  have  entered  or  founded  a  religious  order, 
unless  he  had  been  first  burnt  for  a  heretic.  In  the  nineteenth 
century,  he  lived  to  show  how  much  may  be  done,  -^ay,  how 
much  may  be  enjoyed  by  a  man  whom  society  would  think 
poor.  When  about  to  address  audiences  of  workingnien, 
mostly  artisans  and  mechanics,  he  used  to  say  that  he 
liked  to  think  he  was  not  himself  much  richer  than  they 
were.  True,  there  was  just  the  least  touch  of  exaggera- 
tion in  his  scorn  of  superfluities.  His  ideas  resj)ecting  the 
income  sufficient  for  keeping  a  house  and  rearing  a  family 
sometimes  forced  a  smile  from  those  more  versed  in  the  sordid 
struggles  of  the  world  and  in  the  sad  defacement  of  human 
nature  which  those  struggles  cause.  These  ideas,  however, 
influenced  his  jjolitical  creed.  He  always  believed  in  the  pos- 
sibility of  a  democratic  society,  whose  members  should  be 
intellectual,  refined,  nay  spiritual ;  and,  believing  in  this  pos- 
sibility, he  joyfully  hailed  the  spread  of  democratic  institu- 
tions.    Perhaps  he  did  not  fully  realize  the  enormous  cost  and 


93  Arnold  Ibj/nbee. 

trouble  required  in  most  instances  for  the  full  development  of 
human  faculties.  Perhaps  he  did  not  quite  understand  how 
deep-rooted  in  the  necessity  of  things  is  the  frantic  eagerness 
of  all  men  of  all  classes  and  parties  to  seize  the  means  of  life 
and  expansion.  Carlyle's  comparison  of  mankind  to  a  pot  of 
tamed  Egyptian  vipers,  each  trying  to  get  its  head  above  the 
others,  was  foreign  to  his  way  of  thinking.  Men's  generous 
instincts  and  high  aspirations  he  shared  and  therefore  under- 
stood ;  but  their  imperious  appetites  and  sluggish  consciences 
he  had  only  studied  from  without;  he  had  not  learnt  by 
communing  with  his  own  soul.  Like  Milton,  Shelley  or 
Mazziui,  totally  dissociated  from  the  vulgar  wants  of  the 
upper,  the  lower  or  any  other  class,  he  was  a  democrat,  be- 
cause he  contemned  the  riches  and  honors  of  this  world,  not 
l:>ecau8e  he  was  anxious  to  secure  for  himself  as  much  thereof 
as  fell  to  the  lot  of  any  other  man. 

In  June  of  the  year  1879  Toynbee  married  a  lady  who 
had  for  several  years  been  his  close  friend.  She  survives  to 
mourn  an  irreparable  loss,  and  it  would  not  be  fitting  to  say 
of  their  married  life  more  than  this  that  it  was  singularly 
happy  and  beautiful.  During  the  few  months  immediately 
following  upon  his  marriage  Toynbee  seemed  to  regain  much 
of  the  health  and  elasticity  proj^er  to  his  time  of  life.  The 
pleasure  of  finding  himself  understood  by  the  person  whom  of 
all  others  he  most  valued  and  the  calming  influence  of  a  regu- 
lar occupation  had  a  most  wholesome  effect  upon  his  highly 
strung  and  over-taxed  nerves.  His  constitution  seemed  to 
recruit  itself  daily  in  the  genial  atmosphere  of  a  home.  His 
spirits  became  higher  and  more  equable  than  they  had  been 
for  many  years.  His  thoughts  grew  clearer  and  clearer  to 
him.  It  seemed,  alas  !  it  only  seemed  that  he  was  about  to 
rise  out  of  the  pain  and  weakness  of  youth,  and  to  enter  upon 
a  long  career  of  beneficent  industry.  Too  soon  this  fair  pros- 
pect was  clouded.  He  plunged  with  redoubled  ardor  into  end- 
less and  multifarious  labors.  He  found  so  much  to  do,  he  was 
so  eager  to  do  it  all,  that  he  would  never  seek  rest  and  so  at 


Arnold  Toynbee.  33 

length  rest  would  not  come  to  him.  He  felt  his  intellectual 
power  grow  day  by  day  and  could  not  or  would  not  own  that 
day  by  day  its  working  frayed  more  and  more  the  thread  of 
the  thin-spun  life. 

He  had  never  lost  his  early  preference  for  quiet  study. 
Although  he  had  relinquished  history  and  the  philosophy  of 
history  in  favor  of  political  economy,  he  remained  by  the 
bent  of  his  mind  an  historian.  He  had  learnt  much  from 
the  economic  writings  of  Cliffe  Leslie  which  are  distinguished 
by  the  constant  use  of  the  historical  method ;  but  he  saw  that 
without  the  help  of  deduction,  this  method  can  serve  only  to 
accumulate  a  mass  of  unconnected  and  unserviceable  facts. 
He  did  full  justice  to  the  logical  power  displayed  in  the 
economic  writings  of  John  Stuart  Mill  and  Cairnes.  It  is 
the  more  necessary  to  bear  this  in  mind  because  in  his  essay 
upon  "  Ricardo  and  the  Old  Political  Economy  "  he  assailed 
their  spiritual  father  with  somewhat  of  youthful  vehemence 
and  even  styled  the  Ricardian  system  an  intellectual  impos- 
ture. He  felt  very  strongly  that  our  English  economists  had 
made,  not  too  much  use  of  logic,  but  too  little  use  of  history, 
and,  by  constructing  their  theories  upon  too  narrow  a  basis  of 
fact,  had  lessened  as  well  the  value  as  the  popularity  of  their 
science.  He  saw  that  these  theories  needed  correction  and 
re-statement.  He  would  not  have  denied  their  partial  truth 
nor  would  he  have  echoed  the  newspaper  nonsense  about 
political  economy  having  been  banished  to  the  planet  Saturn. 
Here  as  in  so  many  other  instances  his  intellectual  fairness 
and  love  of  truth  checked  a  sensibility  as  keen  as  that  of 
Owen  or  Ruskin. 

He  was  anxious  to  make  some  worthy  contribution  to 
economic  literature,  and  finally  chose  for  his  subject  the  in- 
dustrial revolution  in  England.  Considering  the  magnitude 
of  that  revolution,  which  turned  feudal  aud  agricultural  into 
democratic  and  commercial  England,  it  is  somewhat  surpris- 
ing that  its  history  should  have  remained  unwritten  to  this 
day.  For  Toynbee  it  had  a  peculiar  fascination.  During  the 
3 


3C  Arnold  Toynbee. 

last  two  years  of  his  life  he  accumulated  a  great  deal  of 
material  for  the  work  and  made  original  investigations  upon 
several  points,  especially  upon  the  decline  of  the  yeomanry. 
Part  of  the  knowledge  thus  amassed  he  gave  out  in  a  course 
of  lectures  delivered  in  Balliol  College;  and  from  the  notes 
of  these  lectures  the  fragments  which  have  been  published 
were  collected.  Few  and  broken,  indeed,  they  are;  yet  full 
of  unavailing  promise.  Other  economists  have  shown  greater 
dialectical  ix)wer;  but  none  have  made  a  happier  use  of  his- 
torical illustration.  He  had  the  faculty  of  picking  out  from 
whole  shelves  of  dusty  literature  the  few  relevant  facts. 
These  facts  he  could  make  interesting  because  he  never  lost 
sight  of  their  relation  to  life.  Political  economy  was  always 
for  him  a  branch  of  politics,  in  the  nobler  sense  of  that  term  ; 
the  industrial  revolution  but  a  phase  of  a  vaster  and  more 
momentous  revolution,  touching  all  the  dearest  interests  of 
man. 

The  problems  suggested  by  a  competitive  system  of  society 
were  always  present  to  his  mind.  He  felt  as  deeply  as  any 
socialist  could  feel  the  evils  incidental  to  such  a  system,  the 
suffering  which  it  often  brings  upon  the  weak,  the  degradation 
which  it  often  brings  about  in  the  strong.  For  the  cure  of 
these  evils,  however,  he  looked  further  than  most  socialists 
do.  Owning  that  competition  was  a  mighty  and,  in  some 
respects,  a  beneficent  power,  he  wrote  that  "of  old  it  was 
hindered  and  controlled  by  custom ;  in  the  future,  like  the 
other  great  physical  forces  of  society,  it  will  be  controlled  by 
morality."  To  the  same  effect  is  the  following  passage :  "  In 
the  past  all  associations  had  their  origin  in  unconscious  physi- 
cal motives;  in  the  future  all  asst>ciations  M'ill  have  their 
origin  in  conscious  ethical  motives.  Here,  as  in  so  many 
other  things,  the  latest  and  most  perfect  development  of 
society  seems  to  be  anticipated  in  its  outward  form  by  the 
most  primitive ;  only  the  inner  life  of  the  form  has  changed." 
In  the  meantime,  he  held  with  John  Stuart  Mill  that  the 
problem  of  distribution  was   the  true   problem  of  political 


Arnold  Toynhee,  35 

economy  at  the  present  day.  Certainly  it  was  the  problem 
which  most  interested  him,  and  his  way  of  handling  it  was 
characteristic.  With  the  habit  of  forming  somewhat  startling 
ideals,  he  had  the  instinct  of  scientific  investigation.  Con- 
vinced that  feeling,  however  pure  or  intense,  is  not  alone 
equal  to  the  improvement  of  society,  he  was  always  toiling  to 
find  in  the  study  of  that  which  is,  the  key  to  that  which  ought 
to  be.  He  would  bury  himself  in  the  dry  details  of  an  actual 
economic  process,  and  emerge  only  to  suggest  in  the  soberest 
terms  some  modest  but  practicable  amelioration.  This  singu- 
larly positive  side  of  his  enthusiastic  nature  is  illustrated  by 
the  letter  to  Mr.  Thomas  lUingworth  of  Bradford,  which  is 
printed  at  the  end  of  this  memoir. 

Toynbee's  interest  in  the  welfare  of  mankind  was  too  eager 
and  impatient  to  be  satisfied  solely  by  the  pursuit  of  truth. 
He  was  zealous  for  that  diffusion  of  political  knowledge 
which  halts  so  immeasurably  behind  the  diffusion  of  political 
power.  He  felt  that  even  now,  in  spite  of  better  education 
and  greater  opportunities  of  reading,  the  bulk  of  the  nation 
scarcely  partakes  in  the  progress  of  science.  The  growing 
wealth  of  recorded  experience,  the  enlargement  and  correction 
of  thought  are  real  only  to  a  few  students  who  exercise  almost 
no  direct  infl.uence  upon  the  course  of  public  affairs,  whilst 
public  men  who  do  exercise  this  influence  are  so  enslaved  to 
the  exigencies  of  each  passing  day  that  they  have  little  time 
or  strength  to  spare  for  the  education  of  their  followers. 
Toynbee  was  anxious  to  utilize  for  political  reform  the  fer- 
ment of  thought  at  the  Universities.  With  this  purpose  he 
drew  together  into  an  informal  society  several  of  the  most 
studious  among  his  younger  contemporaries.  Each  member 
was  to  select  for  his  special  study  some  principal  department 
of  politics,  but  all  were  to  work  in  concert,  and  to  maintain, 
by  meeting  from  time  to  time  for  discussion,  a  general  level 
of  sympathy  and  information.  When  they  had  matured  their 
views  they  were  to  take  part  in  forming  public  opinion  by 
writing  or  by  speaking  as  best  suited  each  man's  talent  and 


36  Arnold  Toynbec, 

opportunities.  The  conception  of  such  a  society  liad  long 
been  familiar  to  him  and  this  was  not  his  first  attempt  to 
carry  it  out.  He  would  dwell  mournfully  on  that  practical 
impotence  of  clever  and  earnest  University  men  which  has 
afforded  so  much  matter  for  exultation  to  the  enemies  of  jx)lite 
letters.  "  Every  one  is  organized,"  he  wrote,  "  from  licensed 
victuallers  to  priests  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  The 
men  of  wide  thought  and  sympathies  alone  are  scattered  and 
helpless." 

The  society  held  its  first  meeting  in  the  June  of  1879  and 
continued  for  three  years  to  meet  once  a  term,  sometimes  in 
London,  but  oftener  in  Oxford.  As  time  went  on  it  was 
joined  by  one  or  two  younger  men  who  shared  the  studies 
and  aims  of  the  original  members.  Toynbee  was  throughout 
the  guiding  and  animating  spirit.  Deep  differences  of  opinion 
necessarily  came  to  light,  but  those  who  differed  most  from 
Toynbee  would  be  the  first  to  confess  how  much  they  have 
learnt  from  discussion  with  him.  So  penetrating  was  his 
earnestness,  so  thorough  his  dialectic,  that  the  faculties  of  all 
who  listened  to  him  were  strained  to  the  utmost.  All  were 
forced  to  ask  themselves  what  they  really  believed  and  why 
they  believed  it.  Toynbee  was  anxious  that  these  debates 
should  not  prove  merely  academic;  and  he  and  his  friends 
spent  some  time  in  considering  how  they  could  best  preach 
their  doctrines.  He  himself  had  a  gift  of  addressing  large 
audiences;  but  this  gift  is  rare,  and  it  is  hard  to  find  any 
other  mode  of  communicating  new  ideas  to  the  people.  A 
volume  of  essays  can  only  he  published  at  a  considerable  cost; 
pamphlets  are  scarcely  read  at  all ;  and  a  newspaper  can  be 
floated  only  by  those  who  have  considerable  capital  or  are 
totally  subservient  to  a  political  party.  In  this  as  in  all  other 
efforts  to  diffuse  enlightenment  we  have  to  shift  as  best  we 
can ;  put  forth  our  opinions  when  we  get  a  chance  and  not 
expect  any  one  else  to  mind  them. 

Toynbee  had  not  forgotten  his  own  success  in  addressing 
the  Tower  Hamlets  Radical  Club.     He  was  resolved  to  use 


Ai-nold  Toynbee.'  Sf 

the  power  which  he  had  then  found  himself  to  possess  in 
communicating  to  the  artisans  of  our  great  towns  the  ideas 
which  he  had  matured  in  the  quiet  of  Oxford.  It  was  his 
design  to  give  every  year  a  certain  number  of  lectures  upon 
such  economic  problems  as  were  of  the  most  pressing  practical 
importance  to  workingmen.  These  lectures  were  not  to  be 
merely  academic  or  merely  partisan.  They  were  to  combine 
the  directness  and  liveliness  of  a  party  harangue  with  the  pre- 
cision and  fairness  of  a  philosophical  discourse.  He  knew 
how  prejudiced  against  political  economy  are  the  poor;  but 
he  knew  that  mistakes  made  by  economists  have  helped  to 
strengthen  that  prejudice,  and  he  believed  that  it  would  yield 
to  frankness  and  sympathy.  He  believed  that  the  masses 
were  eager  for  illumination — that  they  would  be  delighted  to 
follow  any  intelligent  man  of  whose  sincerity  and  disinterested- 
ness they  felt  assured.  He  used  to  refer  to  the  success  which 
had  attended  Mr.  Bradlaugh's  lectures  and  to  the  influence 
which  they  had  exerted,  and  would  urge  that  other  preachers 
with  equal  courage  and  faith  might  gain  a  greater  success  and 
wield  a  far  better  influence. 

It  was  in  the  January  of  1880  that  Toynbee  began  his 
series  of  popular  addresses  by  giving  at  Bradford  three  lec- 
tures upon  Free  Trade,  the  Law  of  Wages  and  England's 
Industrial  Supremacy.  He  did  not  write  out  his  lectures 
beforehand  nor  did  he  speak  from  notes ;  but  having  mas- 
tered his  subject  by  intense  thought,  trusted  for  fitting  words 
to  the  inspiration  of  the  moment.  This  practice,  whilst  it 
increased  the  fatal  strain  u|K)n  his  nervous  system,  added 
much  to  the  grace  and  naturalness  of  his  delivery.  From  the 
faces  of  expectant  listeners  he  drew  the  needful  stimulus  to 
his  power  of  expression.  He  spoke  rapidly  and  continuously, 
yet  with  clearness  and  accuracy.  He  carried  away  his 
audience,  and  their  momentum  carried  him  swiftly  and 
smoothly  to  the  close.  At  Bradford  his  lectures  were  well 
attended  and  well  received  by  both  employers  and  workmen. 
He  was  always  anxious  to  address  both  classes  together  and 


3S  Arnold  Toynbee. 

not  separately,  for  with  bim  it  was  a  prime  object  to  soften 
the  antagonism  between  capital  and  labor,  to  show  that  the 
true,  the  permanent,  interests  of  both  are  identical.  The 
address  npon  Wages  and  Natural  Law  he  suhsequentlj  deliv- 
ered again  at  Firth  College,  Sheffield,  and  it  has  be:n  reprinted 
from  the  shorthand  writer's  reports.  Such  an  address  cannot 
be  expected  to  contain  much  abstruse  cm*  recondite  speculation. 
It  illustrates  very  happily,  however,  the  constant  drift  of  his 
economic  teaching.  It  enforces  Mill's  distinction  betwewj  the 
laws  of  production,  whidi  are  laws  of  nature  uncontrollable 
by  our  will,  and  the  laws  of  distribution,  which  are,  to  a  con- 
siderable extent,  the  result  of  human  contrivance,  and  may  be 
amended  with  the  growth  of  intelligence  and  £Eurness.  Thus, 
it  points  out  that  the  earlier  economists  arrived  at  their  con- 
ception of  a  wages  fund  by  leaving  out  of  account  many  of 
the  causes  which  affect  the  rate  of  wages,  by  forgetting  that  it 
is  not  competition  alone  that  determines  the  rate  of  wi^ics ; 
that  trades  unions,  that  custom,  that  law,  that  public  opinion, 
that  the  character  of  employers  all  influence  wages — that  their 
rate  is  not  governed  by  an  inexorable  law,  nor  determined 
alone  by  what  a  great  writer  once  termed  "  the  brute  law  of 
supply  and  demand.''  This  address  is  also  remarkable  for  a 
candor  uncommon  in  those  who  profess  themselves  ftiends 
and  advocates  of  the  working  elates.  Such  persons  seldom 
address  their  clients  without  slipping  into  a  style  of  flattery. 
Toynbee,  who  loved  the  people  with  all  his  heart  mod  was, 
periiaps,  prejudiced  in  their  fevor,  avoided  this  pemicioas 
cant.  He  reminded  his  hearers  that  a  rise  in  wages  was 
desirable  in  the  interests  of  the  whole  community  only  in  so 
£ir  as  it  led  to  a  rise  in  the  dvilization  of  the  wage-earners. 
"  You  know  only  too  well,"  he  said,  *'  that  too  many  working- 
men  do  not  know  how  to  use  the  wages  which  they  have  at 
the  present  time.  You  know,  too,  that  an  increase  of  wages 
often  means  an  increase  of  crime.  If  workingmen  are  to 
expect  their  employers  to  act  with  larger  notions  of  equity  in 
their  dealings  in  the  labor  market,  it  is,  at  least,  rational  that 


Arnold  Toynbee.  39 

employers  should  expect  that  workingraen  shall  set  about 
reforming  their  own  domestic  life.  It  is,  at  least,  reasonable 
that  thej  should  demand  that  workingmen  shall  combine  to 
put  down  drunkenness  and  brutal  sports."  Coming  from  a 
speaker  whose  affection  was  unquestionable,  sentences  such  as 
the  above  were  taken  in  good  part  by  the  workmen  who 
heai*d  them.  Toynbee  never  found  that  he  lessened  his  popu- 
larity by  abstaining  from  adulation  of  the  people. 

In  the  course  of  January  and  February,  1881,  he  delivered 
twice,  once  at  Newcastle  and  once  at  Bradford,  the  lecture 
entitled  "Industry  and  Democracy."  This  lecture  was  a 
study  of  one  aspect  of  that  great  industrial  revolution  which 
was  ever  present  to  his  thoughts.  Its  central  idea  may  be 
roughly  stated  as  follows.  A  series  of  extraordinary  mechan- 
ical inventions  extending  over  the  latter  half  of  the  eighteenth 
century  shattered  the  old  industrial  organization  of  England 
and  in  particular  broke  the  bond  of  protection  and  dependence 
which  formerly  united  the  employer  and  the  employed.  But 
some  time  elapsed  before  the  revolution  in  the  industrial  was 
followed  by  the  revolution  in  the  political  system.  Some 
time  elapsed  before  the  workman's  economic  isolation  was  fol- 
lowed by  his  political  enfranchisement.  He  had  lost  his 
patron  and  he  was  slow  in  learning  to  help  himself.  This 
interval  was  for  him  a  period  of  suffering  and  for  the  whole 
body  politic  a  period  of  danger.  But  this  epoch  of  dissolu- 
tion has  been  followed  by  an  epoch  of  new  combinations. 
The  workmen  have  organized  themselves  for  their  economic 
and  social  advancement;  and  they  have  acquired  the  fullest 
political  status.  They  are  now  independent  citizens  with 
ampler  rights  and  duties  than  could  have  been  theirs  in  the 
old-fashioned  industrial  and  political  order;  and  thus  in  Eng- 
land, at  least,  the  acutest  crisis  of  the  double  revolution, 
political  and  economical,  has  been  surmounted,  and  an  age  of 
tranquil  development  has  become  possible.  Such  is  the  bare 
outline  of  an  address  abounding  in  knowledge  and  in  thought, 
which  fixed  the  attention  of  very  large  audiences. 


40  Ai'nold  Toynbee. 

A  year  later  he  gave  at  Newcastle,  Bradford  and  Bolton  an 
address  upon  the  question — "  Are  Radicals  Socialists  ?"  This 
was  one  of  the  many  attempts  that  have  been  made  to  settle 
the  true  line  of  separation  between  the  functions  which  must 
be  discharged  by  the  state  and  the  functions  which  may  be 
discharged  by  the  individual.  It  proposed  three  tests  where- 
by to  try  the  wisdom  of  interference  in  any  particular  instance 
by  the  state :  "  first,  the  matter  must  be  one  of  primary  social 
importance ;  next,  it  must  be  proved  to  be  practicable ;  thirdly, 
the  state  interference  must  not  diminish  self-reliance."  It 
will  probably  occur  to  all  who  have  pursued  inquiries  of  this 
nature  that  the  hardest  thing  is,  not  to  lay  down  good  rules, 
but  to  insure  their  observance.  In  our  age,  at  least,  it  is  not 
so  much  want  of  knowledge  as  the  zeal  of  narrow  enthusiasts 
or  the  interested  ambition  of  political  intriguers  which  leads 
to  an  excessive  or  injudicious  interference  by  the  state  with 
the  individual. 

These  were  not  the  only  addresses  which  Toynbee  gave  in 
pursuance  of  his  favorite  plan ;  but  they  have  been  singled 
out  here,  because  they  have  been  reprinted  among  his  literary 
remains  and  are  characteristic  both  in  thought  and  expression. 
They  are  all  pervaded  by  a  hopefulness  heightened,  perhaps, 
by  youth,  yet  innate  in  the  man.  Toynbee  thought  that  the 
conditions  for  solving  the  question  of  the  relation  between 
capital  and  labor  were  to  be  found,  if  in  any  country,  in  Eng- 
land. The  old  habit  of  joint  action  for  public  ends  by  men 
of  every  class ;  the  ennobling  traditions  of  freedom  and  order ; 
the  strong  sense  and  energetic  moderation  often  displayed  by 
the  workmen,  particularly  in  the  north,  their  experience 
acquired  in  organizing  and  administering  trades  unions  and 
co-operative  societies ;  and  the  large  mass  of  property  already 
held  by  them;  all  these  circumstances  convinced  him  that,  in 
England  at  least,  an  even  and  steady  progress  was  possible,  if 
men  of  culture  and  public  spirit  would  offer  themselves  to 
lead  the  way.  He  saw  that  the  laboring  classes  have  political 
power  sufficient  to  insure  the  most  serious  and  respectful  con- 


Arnold  Toynbee.  41 

sideration  of  their  demands  and  he  trusted  that  the  conscious- 
ness of  this  power  and  the  spread  of  education  would  awaken 
in  them  something  of  that  national  feeling,  that  devotion  to 
the  interests  of  the  state  which  has  never  yet  been  wanting  in 
any  age  of  our  history.  If  in  all  this  he  was  too  sanguine, 
yet  was  his  illusion  a  noble  one  which  tended  to  verify  itself. 
Could  politicians  or  journalists  ever  address  workingmen  with- 
out trying  either  to  bribe  or  to  flatter  them,  we  may  be  assured 
that  workingmen  would  respond  to  something  else  beside 
bribes  or  flattery.  It  should  be  added  that  for  these  lec- 
tures he  never  took  any  remuneration  beyond  his  travelling 
expenses,  and  not  always  this. 

Of  all  the  means  employed  by  the  poor  to  better  their 
condition,  the  co-operative  system  appeared  to  him  the  most 
efiectual.  This  system,  we  know,  has  proved  more  successful 
in  distribution  than  in  production  ;  but  it  is  capable  of  indefi- 
nite expansion  in  the  hands  of  intelligent  and  honest  men. 
Toynbee  hoped  that  it  might  come  to  include  a  teaching 
organization.  In  the  winters  of  1880  and  the  following 
years,  he  used  to  lecture  on  political  economy  to  a  class  of 
workingmen,  which  met  at  the  Oxford  Co-operative  Stores. 
Sometimes  he  would  have  his  hearers  at  his  house  on  Sunday 
evenings  and  engage  them  in  general  conversation  on  economic 
subjects.  In  the  course  of  his  work  wMth  this  class  he  formed 
many  friendships  with  individual  workmen,  who  regarded  him 
with  real  devotion.  They  may  still  be  heard  to  say,  "  We 
thought  he  would  have  done  so  much  for  us  and  for  the  town." 
"He  understood  us,"  they  would  say,  "he  took  up  things  and 
led  us  in  a  way  there  seems  no  one  else  to  do."  Toynbee 
used  also  to  contribute  to  the  Oxford  Co-operative  Record. 
In  a  paper  written  for  that  periodical,  entitled  "Cheap  Clothes 
and  Nasty,"  he  urged  the  workingmen  to  remember  what  hard 
and  ill-requited  labor,  the  labor,  too,  of  their  own  class  and 
their  own  kindred,  was  required  to  produce  their  cheap  cloth- 
ing. "The  great  maxim  we  have  all  to  follow,"  he  wrote, 
*'  is  that  the  wel&re  of  the  producer  is  as  much  a  matter  of 


42  Arnold  Toynbee. 

interest  to  the  consumer  as  the  price  of  the  product ; "  wise 
and  true  words,  how  seldom  borne  in  mind.  At  the  Whit- 
suntide of  1882,  when  the  co-operative  societies  held  at  Oxford 
their  annual  congress,  he  read  a  more  elaborate  paper  upon 
"  The  Education  of  Co-operators."  He  showed  how  needful 
and  how  much  neglected  at  the  present  time  is  the  educa- 
tion of  men  as  citizens,  and  suggested  that  the  co-operative 
societies  might  well  provide  for  the  civic  education  of  their 
own  members.  He  then  sketched  a  programme  of  political 
and  economical  instruction.  This  programme  may  be  thought 
ambitious ;  yet  the  address  as  a  whole  is  singularly  balanced 
and  judicial.  He  was  well  aware  that  there  were  many 
obstacles  in  the  way  of  carrying  out  that  which  he  proposed, 
and  that  the  greatest  of  these  obstacles  is  not  the  difficulty 
of  finding  competent  teachers,  nor  the  expense  of  employing 
them,  but  the  apathy  of  those  who  were  to  be  instructed. 
Such  apathy  he  recognized  as  natural  in  men  tired  out  with 
toil;  but  although  natural,  not  the  less  baneful.  "Languor," 
he  truly  said,  "can  only  be  conquered  by  enthusiasm,  and 
enthusiasm  can  only  be  kindled  by  two  things:  an  ideal 
which  takes  the  imagination  by  storm,  and  a  definite  intelligi- 
ble plan  for  carrying  out  that  ideal  into  practice."  In  this 
sentence  he  unconsciously  summed  up  his  own  career.  His 
own  enthusiasm  was  not  of  the  heart  only,  but  of  the  whole 
man ;  it  was  a  reflective  enthusiasm  with  definite  aims  and 
definite  means ;  and  for  this  reason  it  did  not  pass  away  like 
the  sentimental  enthusiasms  of  so  many  generous  young  men  ; 
on  the  contrary,  as  he  grew  older,  it  deepened  until  it  became 
a  consuming  fire. 

The  duties  of  a  Balliol  College  tutor,  the  study  of  a  com- 
plicated science,  the  labors  of  a  public  lecturer  upon  political 
and  social  questions ;  these  might  surely  have  been  enough  to 
task  the  energies  of  a  delicate  man  who  at  his  best  could  only 
work  a  few  hours  a  day  and  was  liable  to  frequent  intervals 
of  forced  inaction.  Yet  there  was  another  task  from  which 
Toynbee  could  not  withhold  his  hand,  a  task  which  for  hira 


Arnold  Toyvbee,  43 

comprised  all  others.  Religion,  it  has  been  said,  was  the 
supreme  interest  of  his  life.  His  mode  of  thinking  about 
religion  has  been  hinted  at  above.  He  had  too  real  a  devo- 
tion to  find  i-ejKJse  in  the  worship  of  an  abstract  noun  or  an 
abstract  sentiment.  He  felt  that  the  religious  emotion,  like 
all  other  emotions,  must  have  a  real  and  an  adequate  object. 
He  saw  distinctly  the  weakness  which  has  so  often  paralyzed 
the  spiritual  influence  of  the  Broad  Church.  "  Had  liberal 
theologians  in  England  combined  more  often  with  their  un- 
doubted courage  and  warmth,  definite  philosophic  views,  reli- 
gious liberalism  would  not  now  be  condemned  as  offering 
nothing  more  than  a  mere  sentiment  of  vague  benevolence. 
Earnest  and  thoughtful  people  are  willing  to  encounter  the 
difficulty  of  mastering  some  unfamiliar  phrases  of  technical 
language,  when  they  find  they  are  in  possession  of  a  sharply 
defined  intellectual  position  upon  which  their  religious  faith 
may  rest." 

Thus  Toynbee,  whilst  in  full  sympathy  with  the  modern 
critical  spirit  which  i-egards  as  provisional  all  dogmas,  even 
those  which  it  may  itself  accept,  was  equally  in  sympathy 
with  the  instinct  of  devotion  which  in  all  ages  has  tried  to 
find  for  itself  a  suitable  dogmatic  expression.  The  intellec- 
tual conceptions  which  support  our  spiritual  life  must  always 
be  inadequate  and  therefore  variable ;  indeed  they  vary  from 
land  to  land,  from  generation  to  generation,  from  class  to 
class  of  a  nation,  from  year  to  year  in  the  life  of  the  indi- 
vidual. But  imperfect  as  these  conceptions  must  be  at  any 
given  time  or  place,  they  cannot  be  summarily  remodelled ; 
for  they  are  the  outcome  of  a  vast  experience,  of  an  almost 
interminable  intellectual  history.  They  are  improved  some- 
times by  direct  and  severe  criticism ;  oftener  by  the  general 
growth  of  civilization  and  increase  of  knowledge.  What  is 
true  of  doctrine  is  likewise  true  of  discipline  and  of  cere- 
monies. All  three  have  had  a  long  development.  The 
various  Churches  now  existing  in  our  own  country  are  full 
of  faults ;  but  they  cannot  be  swept  away  at  a  stroke,  nor,  if 


j44  Arnold  Toynbee. 

they  could,  would  there  be  anything  better  to  take  their 
place.  To  Toynbee  a  Church,  like  a  State,  was  a  mighty 
historical  institution,  the  result  of  desires,  hopes,  l^liefs  which 
only  in  building  it  up  could  have  found  their  satisfaction. 
Like  a  State,  a  Church  had  grown  to  be  what  it  was  and 
might  grow  to  be  something  much  better.  How,  he  asked 
himself,  could  a  devout  man,  totally  without  sectarian  preju- 
dice, assist  even  by  a  little  that  almost  imperceptible  growth  ? 
Certainly  the  survey  of  the  state  of  religion  in  England  at 
the  present  time  does  not  readily  suggest  an  answer  to  this 
question.  Confusion  is  everywhere.  We  see  many  men  of 
strong  and  cultivated  intelligence,  no  longer  obliged  to  fight 
for  spiritual  freedom,  lapsing  into  an  epicurean  indifference, 
the  more  profound  l)ecause  it  is  so  thoroughly  goodnatured; 
This  indifference  is  no  longer  confined  to  a  few  polished  scep- 
tics. It  is  <5hared  by  possibly  the  greater  part  of  those  who 
live  by  manual  labor.  It  is  not  rare  among  women,  always 
slower  than  men  to  part  from  the  creed  of  their  forefathers. 
A  sincere  piety  is  still  common  among  us,  but  this  piety,  too 
often  unenlightened,  is  frequently  a  principle  of  discord. 
Many  zealous  priests  and  laymen  of  the  Established  Church 
seem  intent  upon  developing  everj-thing  that  is  least  rational 
in  her  doctrine,  least  sober  and  manly  in  her  ritual.  The 
Nonconformists,  earnest  as  they  are,  seem  condemned  by  their 
passionate  spirit  of  division  to  everlasting  pettiness  and  ster- 
ility. The  Church  of  Rome,  now  as  heretofore,  invites,  often 
with  success,  the  timid  and  devout  to  abjure  all  the  truths  and 
all  the  liberties  won  in  the  battle  of  the  last  six  centuries  and 
to  immure  their  souls  in  her  dogmatic  cloister.  Look  whore 
we  may,  we  nowhere  behold  realized  the  complete  ideal  of  a 
national  church.  Religion,  ceasing  to  be  national,  has  lost 
half  its  life  and  power.  Any  reformation  which  is  to  restore 
its  vigor  mu.«t  render  it  national  once  more. 

For  such  a  reformation,  the  Church  of  England  as  by  law 
estiiblished  offers  more  facilities  than  any  other.  National  it 
is,  not  only  as  the  largest  religious  community  in  the  kingdom, 


■Arnold  Toynbee.  45 

but  also  as  acknowledging  in  every  Englishman  a  right  to  its 
ministrations,  in  having  for  its  head  the  head  of  the  state,  and 
in  admitting  of  regulation  by  the  Imperial  Parliament.  Its 
history  has  always  been  linked  with  the  history  of  the  nation. 
If  in  former  times  it  abused  its  power,  it  is  at  the  present  day 
tolerant  and  open  to  ideas  to  an  extent  unparalleled  in  the 
history  of  religion.  It  embraces  members  of  the  most  various, 
not  to  say,  contradictory  opinions;  and  this  fact,  so  often  cited 
as  its  disgrace,  is  really  its  glory,  since  in  a  free  and  critical 
age  no  two  thinking  men  can  word  for  word  subscribe  the 
same  creed.  The  only  church  possible  in  modern  times  is 
a  church  whose  members,  whilst  several  in  thought,  yet 
remain  united  in  piety.  The  Catholics  are  not  mistaken 
when  they  insist  upon  the  power  which  springs  from  unity ; 
the  Nonconformists  are  in  the  right  when  they  insist  upon  the 
freedom  and  the  responsibility  of  the  individual  soul.  The 
Church  of  England  has  endeavored,  weakly  indeed  and  inter- 
mittently, to  reconcile  unity  with  freedom.  It  has  been  able 
to  do  so  because  it  has  been  a  state  church.  The  service  of 
the  state  is  perfect  freedom  as  compared  with  the  yoke  of  the 
priest  or  the  yoke  of  the  coterie.  All  that  was  best  in  the 
Church  of  England  appeared  to  Toynbee  indissolubly  linked 
with  her  alliance  with  the  state.  Viewing  the  state  as  some- 
thing more  than  a  mechanical  contrivance  for  material  ends, 
as  a  union  of  men  for  the  highest  purposes  of  human  nature, 
he  did  not  regard  it  as  inferior  to  the  church  or  think  the 
church  degraded  by  connection  with  the  state.  The  church 
and  the  state  were  to  him  but  different  aspects  of  the  same 
society.  Like  his  friend  Thomas  Hill  Green  he  felt  an 
intense  antipathy  to  the  pretensions  of  the  sacerdotal  party 
who  understand  by  the  freedom  of  the  church  the  domina- 
tion of  the  clergy.  He  felt  an  equally  strong  antipathy  for 
the  tyranny  over  thought  and  action  exercised  by  the  petty 
majorities  in  what  are  known  as  the  free  churches.  He 
believed  that  real  religious  freedom  was  only  possible  in  a 
national  church,  and  that  there  could  be  no  national  church 


46  Arnold  Toynbee. 

without  the  assistance  of  the  state.  But  he  acknowledged  that 
the  Church  of  England  cannot  be  truly  national  until  she 
gives  self-government  to  her  congregations  and  releases  her 
ministers  from  subscription. 

To  effect  these  changes  had  been  the  object  of  the  Church 
Reform  Union,  formerly  organized  by  Mr.  Thomas  Hughes 
and  the  Reverend  Mr.  Llewelyn  Davies,  but  then  in  a  rather 
sleepy  condition.  Toynbee  tried  to  give  it  fresh  life  and 
induced  these  gentlemen  to  reopen  the  discussion  of  church 
reform.  He  persuaded  several  of  his  friends  to  join  the 
Union  and  organized  an  Oxford  branch,  besides  writing  leaf- 
lets to  enlist  the  sympathy  of  the  laboring  classes.  He  went 
so  far  as  to  appear  at  the  Church  Congress  held  at  Leicester 
in  the  year  1880,  and  to  deliver  an  addrcas  upon  the  subject 
of  Church  Reform.  Had  his  life  been  prolonged,  he  might 
have  achieved  much  for  the  cause.  The  eloquent  enthusiasm 
with  which  he  used  to  dwell  upon  the  ideal  relations  of  Church 
and  State  made  a  deep  impression  upon  men  of  very  different 
religious  beliefs.  The  impression  cannot  be  reproduced  in 
words,  because  it  was  originally  due  to  something  unspoken 
and  indefinable  in  the  man.  Something  of  the  spirit  in  which 
he  approached  the  question  may  be  caught  from  the  following 
passage: — 

"To  teach  the  people,  the  ministers  of  religion  must  be 
independent  of  the  people,  to  lead  the  people,  they  must  be  in 
advance  of  the  people.  Individual  interests  are  not  always 
public  interests.  It  is  the  public  interest  that  a  country  should 
be  taught  a  pure  and  spiritual  religion ;  it  is  the  interest  of 
religious  teachers  to  teach  that  which  will  be  acceptable  at  the 
moment.  It  is  for  the  public  interest  that  religion  should  be 
universal,  that  it  should  be  a  bond  of  union,  that  it  should  be 
progressive.  The  State,  and  not  the  individual,  is  best  calcu- 
lated to  provide  such  a  religion.  We  saw  before  that  freedom 
being  obtained,  it  was  religion  that  was  to  weld  free  but 
isolated  beings  into  a  loving  interdependent  whole.  Which  is 
the  more  likely  to  do  this — a  religion  wise  and  rational,  com- 


Arnold  Tuynbee.  47 

prehensive  and  universal,  recognizing  a  progressive  revelation 
of  God,  such  as  the  State  may  provide,  or  a  religion  provided 
by  individual  interests  which  is  liable  to  become  what  is  pop- 
ular at  the  moment,  which  accentuates  and  multiplies  divisions, 
which  perpetuates  obsolete  forms,  and  has  no  assurance  of  uni- 
versality of  teaching?  It  is  scarcely  too  much  to  say  that  as 
an  independent  j)roducer  can  only  live  by  satisfying  physical 
wants  in  the  best  way,  the  independent  sect  or  independent 
minister  can  only  live  by  satisfying  spiritual  wants  in  the 
worst  way.  If  I  thought  that  disestablishment  were  best  for 
the  spiritual  interests  of  the  people,  I  would  advocate  it,  but 
only  on  such  a  principle  can  it  be  justified,  and  my  argument 
is,  that  spiritual  evil,  not  good,  would  attend  it. 

"  What  is  really  required  is  a  body  of  independent  ministers 
in  contact  at  once  with  the  continuous  revelation  of  God  in 
man,  and  in  nature,  and  with  the  religious  life  of  the  people. 
The  State  alone  can  establish  such  a  church  organization  as 
shall  insure  the  independence  of  the  minister,  by  securing  him 
his  livelihood  and  protecting  hun  from  the  spiri;ual  despotism 
of  the  people.  I  believe  the  argument  holds  good  for  religion 
as  for  education,  that  it  is  of  such  importance  to  the  iState 
itself,  to  the  whole  community  collectively,  that  it  behoves  the 
State  not  to  leave  it  to  individual  effort,  which,  as  in  the  case 
of  education,  either  docs  not  satisfy  spiritual  wants  at  all,  or 
does  not  satisfy  them  in  the  best  way.  If  I  chose  to  particu- 
larize, I  might  here  add  that  the  connection  of  religion  with 
the  State  is  the  most  eflPective  check  to  sacerdotalism  in  all  its 
different  forms,  and  sacerdotalism  is  the  form  of  religion  which 
can  become  fundamentally  dangerous  to  the  State.  It  injures 
the  State  spiritually  by  alienating  the  greatest  number  and  the 
most  intellectual  of  the  members  of  the  State  from  religion 
altogether;  it  injures  the  State  temporally  by  creating  an  antag- 
onism between  Church  and  State — a  great  national  calamity 
from  which  we  are  now  entirely  free." 

It  must  not  be  concluded  from  the  above  quotation  that 
Toynbee  regarded  as  just  or  expedient  the  present  impotence 


48  Arnold  Toynhee, 

of  the  laity  of  the  Church  of  England.  He  would  have  been 
in  favor  of  investing  each  congregation  with  almost  any  power 
short  of  the  power  to  dismiss  its  minister  at  discretion ;  but 
he  tliought  that  the  ultimate  control  of  the  Church  was  more 
safely  vested  in  a  democratic  Parliament  than  in  the  inhabi- 
tants of  each  parish.  In  the  same  spirit  of  compromise  he 
would  have  abolished  "clerical  subscription,"  the  formal 
declaration  of  assent  to  the  Articles  and  the  teaching  of  the 
English  Book  of  Common  Prayer,  which  is  demanded  from 
every  minister  of  the  Established  Church.  It  might  have 
been  objected  to  him  that,  by  abolishing  "  subscription,"  the 
clerical  profession  is  thrown  open  to  men  of  every  religion 
and  of  no  religion.  He  might  have  replied  that  the  only 
practical  consequence  of  enforcing  "subscription"  is  to  exclude 
from  the  ministry  a  few  delicately  spiritual  natures,  who 
honor  it  too  much  to  l)egin  their  professional  life  with 
solemnly  assenting  to  a  series  of  obscure  propositions  drawn 
up  by  the  statesmen  of  the  sixteenth  century.  Nevertheless, 
we  must  allow  that  Toynbee  failed  fully  to  comprehend  the 
difficulty  of  his  undertaking.  He  had  found  his  religion  for 
himself,  and  it  was  all  the  more  real  to  him  because  freed 
from  everything  which  was  not  spiritual.  He  could  not, 
therefore,  realize  the  extravagant  value  which  most  of  the 
members  of  every  Church  attach  to  the  accidents  of  their 
spiritual  life,  especially  to  all  modes  of  doctrine,  ritual  or 
government  which  serve  to  distinguish  them  from  other 
Churches.  Men  are  most  partial  to  that  which  is  distinct- 
ively their  own.  Let  it  be  trivial,  unmeaning,  mischievous, 
still  it  is  theirs,  and,  as  such,  sacred.  The  smallest  conces- 
sions upon  the  part  of  the  Established  Church  would  often 
have  hindered  the  rise  of  new  sects.  The  diiferences  which 
divide  most  sects  from  one  another  and  from  the  Established 
Church  are,  in  many  cases,  too  small  for  the  naked  eye,  and 
intelligible  only  when  subjected  to  the  historic  microscope. 
It  does  not  follow  that  these  concessions  would  have  been 
easy — that  those  differences  can  now  be  healed. 


Arnold  Toynbee,  49 

Whilst  broodiDg  over  ideals  of  Church  and  State,  Toynbee 
was  always  ready  to  lavish  time  and  thought  in  furthering 
the  welfare  of  his  immediate  neighbors.  In  devotion  to  the 
welfare  of  the  city  of  Oxford,  he  rivalled  his  friend  Professor 
Green.  In  the  year  1881  he  was  appointed  to  the  board  of 
"Guardians  of  the  Poor."  The  granting  of  relief,  except 
within  the  walls  of  the  workhouse,  he  had  always  condemned 
on  the  ground  that  it  tended  to  lower  wages  and  to  relax 
industry ;  and  when  he  became  a  guardian  he  uniformly 
acted  upon  this  opinion.  At  the  same  time  he  felt  the  cru- 
elty of  compelling  the  deserving  poor  to  take  refuge  in  the 
workhouse,  and  the  necessity  of  replacing  "outdoor"  relief  by 
organized  charity,  which  should  assist  them  in  the  most  effect- 
ual manner  and  make  between  the  givers  and  receivers  a  bond 
of  kindness  and  of  gratitude.  He  therefore  joined  the  com- 
mittee of  the  Oxford  Branch  of  the  Charity  Organization 
Society,  thus  helping  to  establish  a  concert  between  the  public 
and  the  private  relief  of  distress.  He  took  extmordinary 
trouble  in  the  investigation  of  cases  of  poverty  and  in  securing 
uniformity  and  thoroughness  in  the  operations  of  the  Society. 
Nothing  more  enhanced  the  regard  felt  for  him  by  the  working 
men  of  Oxford  than  did  these  labors.  They  were  indeed  too 
much  for  one  so  weak  in  body  and  so  heavily  burthened  with 
other  employments.  But  he  felt  the  necessity  of  not  merely 
conceiving  and  uttering,  but  also  in  some  small  degree  execut- 
ing fine  ideas.  As  a  Christian  and  a  citizen  he  thought  him- 
self in  conscience  bound  to  take  his  share  of  social  drudgery, 
and  to  this  austere  sense  of  duty  he  sacrificed  the  few  hours 
of  rest  which  he  so  much  needed,  the  scanty  remains  of 
strength  which  might  have  been  employed  in  so  many  other 
ways  more  likely  to  bring  fame  and  power.  It  was  the  reward 
of  Toynbee's  thoroughly  sincere  and  practical  spirit  that  he  was 
always  learning.  His  imagination  was  ever  prone  to  pass  be- 
yond the  bounds  of  possibility ;  but  his  habit  of  action  con- 
stantly checked  the  disposition  to  reverie. 

In  spite  of  all  the  public  labors  which  he  had  imposed  upon. 
4 


CO  Arnold  Toynbee. 

himself  he  took  the  utmost  pains  with  his  pupils,  the  selected 
candidates  for  the  Indian  Civil  Service.  He  chiefly  taught 
them  political  economy  and  could  not  go  very  deeply  into  that 
subject,  because  with  them  it  was  one  of  a  multitude  in  which 
they  had  to  be  examined.  But  feeling  how  enormous  a  respon- 
sibility would  hereafter  rest  upon  these  lads  he  diligently  studied 
the  recent  history  and  present  condition  of  our  Indian  Empire. 
He  did  what  he  could  to  quicken  their  sense  of  the  great 
interests  committed  to  their  charge.  Nor  did  he  fail  to  culti- 
vate those  kindly  personal  relations  between  tutor  and  pupil 
which  are  so  precious  an  element  in  the  life  of  the  University. 
Besides  his  tutorship  he  held  for  some  time  l)efore  his  death 
the  office  of  senior  bursar  to  Balliol  College.  In  this  charac- 
ter he  made  the  acquaintance  of  the  tenants  of  the  College 
estates,  with  whom  he  si)eedily  became  popular.  The  work 
interested  him  as  affording  a  practical  knowledge  of  the  state 
of  agriculture.  So  highly  did  the  College  value  his  services 
in  this  and  in  every  other  capacity  that  it  was  resolved  to 
elect  him  a  Fellow,  and  the  resolution  was  defeated  only  by 
his  untimely  death. 

With  such  a  variety  of  occupations  Toynbee  was  not  able 
to  take  many  holidays  in  the  years  following  his  marriage. 
In  the  summer  of  1880  he  had  spent  five  delightful  weeks 
in  Switzerland,  and  on  his  return  journey  had  stopped  at 
Mulhausen  to  inspect  its  cotton  factories  and  cite  ouviih'e — 
a  town  of  model  houses  for  the  o[)eratives,  which  they 
might  acquire  in  perpetuity  by  gradual  payments.  Part  of 
the  summer  of  1882  he  spent  in  Ireland,  but  this  was  not 
for  him  a  time  of  rest.  He  used  his  utmost  endeavors  to 
become  acquainted  M'ith  the  true  state  of  the  peasantry,  would 
stop  them  by  the  wayside  or  sit  for  hours  in  their  cabins 
listening  to  endless  talk.  Eager  and  excitable  as  he  was,  he 
could  not  use  his  intelligence  without  agitating  his  feelings. 
On  his  way  home  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Michael 
Davitt,  who  seems  to  have  been  deeply  impressed  with  Toyn- 
bee's  conversation.  Mr.  Davitt  subsequently  wrote  when 
sending  a  contribution  to  the  Memorial  Fund  : 


Arnold  Toynbee.  51 

"  I  had  the  pleasure  of  making  the  acquaintance  of  the  late 
Mr.  A.  Toynbee  during  his  Irish  tour,  as  well  as  the  advan- 
tage of  a  subsequent  correspondence,  and  few  men  have  ever 
impressed  me  so  much  with  being  possessed  of  so  passionate  a 
desire  to  mitigate  the  lot  of  human  misery.  In  his  death  this 
unfortunate  country  has  lost  one  thoroughly  sincere  English 
friend  and  able  advocate,  who,  had  he  lived,  would  have 
devoted  some  of  his  great  talents  to  the  task  of  lessening  his 
countrymen's  prejudice  against  Ireland." 

During  the  three  terms  from  October,  1881,  to  June,  1882, 
Toynbee  gave  a  course  of  lectures  on  the  industrial  revolution 
to  students  reading  for  Honors  in  the  School  of  Modem  History. 
These  lectures  were  extremely  well  received.  In  the  autumn 
of  1882  he  offered  himself  in  the  North  Ward  of  Oxford  as  a 
Liberal  candidate  for  the  Town  Council,  and  made  three 
speeches  chiefly  upon  those  aspects  of  municipal  government 
which  concern  social  reform,  such  as  the  administration  of 
poor  relief  and  the  construction  of  artizans'  and  laborers' 
dwellings.  He  also  threw  out  the  idea  of  volunteer  sanitary 
committees  for  the  enforcement  of  the  laws  relating  to  public 
health.  He  himself  took  some  steps  towards  the  organization 
of  such  a  committee,  and  many  have  since  been  established 
elsewhere.  In  the  December  of  the  same  year  he  attended  a 
Liberal  meeting  at  Newbury,  in  Berkshire,  and  made  a  speech 
upon  the  Land  Question  and  the  Agricultural  Laborer. 

He  had  for  some  time  been  familiar  with  a  book  then  little 
known  and  since  famous — Henry  George's  "  Progress  and 
Poverty."  In  this  year  he  wrote  in  one  of  his  letters  to  a 
sister :  "  I  have  known  Greorge's  book  for  a  very  long  time. 
I  always  thought  it,  while  full  of  fallacies  and  crude  concep- 
tions, very  remarkable  for  its  style  and  vigor,  and  while  no 
economist  would  be  likely  for  a  moment  to  be  staggered  by  its 
theories,  it  is  very  likely  to  seem  convincing  to  the  general 
reader.  I  remember  last  year  at  the  Master's  (i.  e.  Professor 
Jowett),  Mr.  Fawcett  asking  me  to  tell  him  about  it — he  had 
not  read  it  even  then."     So  much  was  he  struck  by  the  book 


52  Arnold  Toynbee. 

that  he  gave  two  lectures  upon  it  at  Oxford  in  the  Michaehuas 
term  of  1882.  At  the  conclusion  of  the  second  lecture  he 
made  an  earnest  appeal  to  his  younger  hearers  not  to  let  the 
lawful  ambitious  of  life,  nor  its  domestic  joys,  make  them 
forgetful  of  the  lofty  ideals  or  of  the  generous  resolutions  to 
ameliorate  the  condition  of  the  poor  and  neglected  which  they 
might  have  cherished  at  the  University.  Many  were  deeply 
moved  by  this  appeal,  and  he  afterwards  expressed  the  thought 
that  he  might  have  spoken  with  too  much  solemnity,  but 
added,  as  if  by  way  of  excuse,  "  I  could  not  help  it."  These 
lectures  were  the  last  which  he  ever  gave  in  Oxford. 

Indeed  the  end  of  all  things  earthly  was  now  very  near. 
For  many  months  past  he  had  been  growing  pale  and  haggard. 
He  was  wasted  almost  to  a  skeleton.  His  old  gaiety  had 
almost  forsaken  him.  The  death  of  his  friend  and  teacher. 
Professor  Green,  had  deepened  his  depression.  Yet  he  sought 
no  rest.  He  faced  his  growing  labors  with  a  stubborn 
resolution  which  concealed  from  his  friends  and  possibly  from 
himself  an  approaching  failure  of  strength.  In  the  Jan- 
uary of  1883,  he  repeated  at  St.  Andrew's  Hall,  Newman 
Street,  London,  his  lectures  on  "Progress  and  Poverty."  His 
audience  was  large  and  representative.  At  the  fii'st  lecture 
it  listened  with  attention.  At  the  second,  a  small  but  noisy 
minority  made  a  considerable  disturbance.  His  strength  had 
declined  in  the  interval,  and  from  the  second  lecture  he  went 
back  to  Wimbledon  a  dying  man.  In  early  childhood  he  had 
suffered  concussion  of  the  brain  in  consequence  of  a  fall  from 
a  pony ;  and  ever  since  then  exhaustion  with  him  was  apt  to 
bring  on  sleeplessness.  So  worn  and  excited  was  he  now,  that 
even  with  the  help  of  the  strongest  opiates  he  could  get  no 
sleep.  His  mind,  wandering  and  unstrung,  turned  again  and 
again  to  the  one  preoccupation  of  his  life ;  to  the  thought  of 
all  the  sin  and  misery  in  the  world.  At  times  a  strange 
unearthly  cheerfulness  broke  through  his  gloom.  He  con- 
stantly asked  to  lie  in  the  sun — to  let  the  light  stream  in  upon 
him;  murmuring,  "Light  purifies — the  sun  bums  up  evil — let 


AiTiold  Toynbee.  53 

in  the  light."  He  did  not  experience  much  bodily  suifering ; 
but  sleeplessness  brouglit  on  inflammation  of  the  brain  ;  and 
after  seven  weeks  of  illness  he  died  on  the  9th  of  March,  1883, 
in  the  thirty-first  year  of  his  age. 

He  lies  beside  his  father  in  the  churchyard  of  Wimbledon. 
It  is  a  beautiful  spot,  overshadowed  with  the  everlasting  ver- 
dure of  the  ilex  and  cedar.  There  many  generations  have 
f  lund  rest  from  hope  and  desire;  but  few  or  none  among  them 
all  have  been  mourned  so  widely  and  so  sincerely  as  Arnold 
Toynbee.  It  is  easy  to  make  a  catalogue  of  the  opinions, 
writings  and  actions  of  any  man ;  to  enumerate  in  order  the 
events  of  his  life ;  to  sum  up  his  virtues  and  his  failings : 
and,  this  done,  we  have  what  they  call  a  life.  Yet  life  is  the 
only  thing  wanting  to  such  a  performance.  In  every  man  of 
fine  gifts,  there  is  something,  and  that  the  finest  element  of  all, 
which  eludes  so  rough  a  procedure.  There  is  something  which 
those  who  have  known  him  have  felt  without  being  able  to 
express ;  something  which  pervaded  every  thing  he  said  or  did, 
something  unique;  irreparable,  not  to  be  stated,  not  to  be 
forgotten.  Most  indescribable,  most  exquisite  is  this  charm 
blending  with  the  freshness  of  early  youth,  like  the  scent  of 
innumerable  flowers  floating  upon  a  gentle  breeze  from  the 
ocean.  Length  of  added  years  would  have  brought  the 
achievement  of  tasks  hardly  begun,  the  maturity  of  thoughts 
freshly  conceived,  and  the  just  rewards  of  widely  extended 
fame  and  reputation ;  but  it  could  not  have  added  anything 
to  the  personal  fascination  of  Arnold  Toynbee,  or  enhanced 
the  sacred  regard  with  which  all  who  had  the  great  happiness 
to  know  and  the  great  sorrow  to  lose  him  will  cherish  his 
memory  whilst  life  endures. 


APPENDIX. 


LETTER  TO  THOMAS  ILLINGWORTH,  Esq.,  OF  BEADFOED. 

Oxford,  January  21,  1880. 

Dear  Sir :  1  have  read  your  very  clear  account  of  the  credit  system  as 
you  have  seen  it  in  operation  with  great  interest.  The  facts  you  give  will 
be  of  much  value  as  an  addition  to  those  usually  found  in  the  textbooks  on 
Political  Economy.  If  I  understand  you  rightly,  you  advocate,  as  a  remedy 
for  the  evils  we  both  discern,  the  adoption  of  a  cash  system  of  trading. 
But  I  do  not  quite  see  how  such  a  system  is  to  be  adopted,  as  long  as  it  is 
the  interest — the  immediate  interest  of  firms  to  give  the  long  credit  you 
speak  of  in  order  to  obtain  custom.  That  is  (as  you  point  out),  excessive 
competition  is  at  the  bottom  of  a  reckless  credit  system,  and  the  probleu, 
is,  how  can  we  restrain  this  competition,  and  make  it  the  interest  of  meu  to 
adopt  a  cash  system.  Take  the  analogous  case  of  adulteration.  This  also 
is  the  result  of  excessive  competition.  The  problem  is — How  cau  we  make 
it  the  interest  of  manufacturers  to  sell  pure  goods?  It  is  a  well-known  fact 
that  honest  manufacturers  have  reluctantly  given  in  to  the  practice  of 
adulteration  because  they  found  that  if  they  refused  to  execute  the  orders 
offered  them  by  merchants,  other  manufacturers  accepted  them,  and  they 
were  driven  out  of  the  market.  Of  course,  where  a  great  firm  with  an 
established  reputation  have  possession  of  a  market,  it  may  be  for  their 
interest  to  sell  unadulterated  goods — they  may  lose  their  market  if  their 
goods  deteriorate.  But  when  manufacturers  are  seeking  to  make  a  rapid 
fortune  on  borrowed  capital,  it  is  often  for  their  interest  to  sell  as  much  as 
they  can  in  as  short  a  time  as  possible.  They  do  not  w^ant  to  build  up  a 
trade  reputation,  but  to  make  money  and  to  leave  the  trade. 

Now  I  tried  to  show  in  my  lecture  the  various  restrictions  Avhich  have 
made  it  the  interest  of  men  to  be  honest  and  humane.  You  cannot  expect 
the  great  mass  of  men  to  be  moral  unlets  it  is  their  interest  to  be  moral. 
That  is,  if  the  average  man  finds  that  honesty,  instead  of  being  the  best 
jK)licy,  is  the  high  road  to  ruin,  he  will  certainly  be  dishonest,  and  the 
whole  community  suflers.  It  is  obvious  that  a  man  will  not  sell  pure  milk 
if  he  finds  that  he  is  being  undersold  by  competitors  who  sell  adulterated 

55 


56  Arnold  Toynbee. 

milk  to  careless  and  ignorant  customers — a  man  will  not  sell  pure  goods  of 
any  kind  if  he  finds  that  he  is  being  undersold  by  those  who  sell  adulter- 
ated goods.  But  why  is  it  possible  for  the  manufacturer  to  sell  adulterated 
goods?  Because  of  the  ignorance,  apathy  and  helplessness  of  the  isolated 
consumer.  If  he  is  not  apathetic,  he  is  ignorant  and  helpless.  What  does 
the  ordinary  consumer  know  about  the  quality  of  goods?     Nothing  at  all. 

Now  I  wished  to  show  that  owing  to  recognized  causes  consumers  wa-e 
forming  unions  to  buy  goods — the  organization  of  consumption  was  taking 
place.  And  further  I  tried  to  hint  the  possible  effects  of  this  organization 
of  consumption  on  (1)  adulteration,  (2)  fluctuation  of  prices  due  to  abuse  of 
the  credit  system  and  the  factory  system.  I  think  the  cash  system  you 
advocate  might  be  possible,  where  consumers  are  organized  in  unions, 
because  it  would  there  become  the  interest  of  both  buyers  and  sellers  to 
adopt  it. 

I  agree  with  you  that  it  is  quite  possible  that  retail  distribution  in  the 
future  will  take  place  through  enormous  stores  in  the  hands  of  companies 
or  private  persons — that  there  is  nothing  magical  in  co-operative  stores. 
Bui  whatever  system  prevails,  there  is  no  doubt  that  the  excessive  compe- 
tition and  waste  in  retail  distribution  will  gradually  diminish  and  that  we 
shall  have,  instead  of  innumerable  shops,  groups  of  large  stores  with  thou- 
sands of  permanent  customers.  That  is  the  first  point — the  organization  of 
consumption.  Next  it  is  an  admitted  fact  that  the  producers  and  consumers 
are  drawing  together  owing  to  the  telegraph  and  improved  means  of  com- 
munication. Intermediate  agents  are  being  eliminated.  One  result  is 
that  long  credits  are  not  so  necessary  as  before. 

Now  in  these  two  points — the  organization  of  consumption  and  the 
eKmination  of  the  distance  between  producers  and  consumers — I  think, 
lies  our  hope. 

(1)  For  (throwing  aside  the  idea  of  contracts  for  terms  of  years)  it  will 
now  be  possible  for  the  consumer  through  these  stores  to  buy  directly  of 
the  producer.  The  intermediate  dealers  whose  interest  it  was  to  "dare 
forward,"  etc.,  are  eliminated — the  consumer  buys,  say,  at  the  ordinary 
trade  credit.  I  need  not  attempt  a  more  detailed  explanation.  The  only 
difficulty  I  see  is  that  different  manufacturers  in  competing  for  custom 
might  try  and  outbid  each  other,  offering  long  credit ;  but  it  is  more  prob- 
able that  the  competition  would  affect  price. 

(2)  As  education  and  the  taste  for  better  goods  grows  stronger,  the  con- 
sumer will  be  able  through  the  stores  to  employ  skilful  buyers  to  select 
unadulterated  commodities  which  he  individually  could  not  do.  The 
honest  manufacturer  would  be  protected  from  the  competition  of  dishonest 
rivals. 

(3)  Speculation  being  minimized  owing  to  the  elimination  of  the  inter- 
mediate agents,  it  would  be  possible  for  manufacturers  to  anticipate  the 
demand  for  goods — and  this  would  be  facilitated  by  the  concentration  of 
consumers. 


The  Work  of  Toynhee  Hall.  57 

But  I  have  said  enough.  I  should  like  to  have  drawn  out  this  idea  in 
greater  detail,  but  I  am  pressed  for  time.  I  hope  what  I  have  written  is 
intelligible.  The  question  I  should  like  answered  is — how  would  it  be 
possible  to  procure  the  adoption  of  a  cash  system  as  things  are  at  present. 
I  do  not  wish  to  draw  you  into  a  correspondence,  but  I  should  like  to  have 
an  answer  on  that  point.  As  I  said  in  my  last  letter,  I  hope  I  may  some 
day  have  the  pleasure  of  talking  to  you  on  this  subject.    I  am, 

Yours  very  truly, 

Arnold  ToniBEE. 

P.  S. — (1)  Is  it  in  the  least  probable  that  merchants  would  associate  in 
order  to  put  an  end  to  the  abuse  of  the  credit  system  ?  Is  not  competition 
too  keen  and  are  not  interests  too  much  at  variance  ? 

(2)  Legislation  on  thb  point  would  be  impossible — would  it  not? 


THE  WORK  OF  TOYNBEE  HALL. 
By  Philip  Lyttelton  Gell,  Chairman  of  the  OouneiL 

I  have  been  asked  to  add  to  this  brief  account  of  Arnold  Toynbee  an 
equally  brief  de.scription  of  the  somewhat  complex,  undertaking  now  widely 
known  as  "Toynbee  Hall."  Without  having  been  founded  by  Arnold 
Toynbee,  as  is  often  imagined,  without  even  aiming  consciously  at  the  em- 
bodiment of  his  views,  nothing  could  better  prove  the  wide  acceptance  and 
stability  of  those  principles  of  social  responsibility  upon  which  Arnold 
Toynbee  in  his  short  life  insisted. 

Those  who  have  read  the  preceding  pages  will  have  gathered  how 
emphatic  an  answer  Arnold  Toynbee  gave  to  the  cynical  or  hopeless  appeal 
of  the  apostles  of  laissez-faire,  "  Am  I  my  brother's  keeper ! "  In  his  own 
aspirations,  in  his  conversation,  in  his  theories  of  politics  and  economics, 
in  the  practical  activity  of  his  own  life,  this  responsibility  was  the  under- 
lying and  undying  factor.  The  results  of  economical  laws  were  to  him  not 
forces  to  be  noted  and  then  accepted,  but  forces  to  be  wrestled  with  and 
controlled  by  the  still  superior  ascendency  of  human  character.  His  sense 
of  responsibility  made  him  no  Utopian  philanthropist,  his  sense  of  human 
injustice  and  human  suffering  never  made  him  revolutionary,  but  only  inten- 
sified his  civic  earnestness.  He  was  a  good  citizen  who  instinctively  seized 
upon  each  and  every  civic  institution,  seeking  to  increase  its  special  effect- 
iveness and  to  ennoble  its  working  for  the  benefit  of  his  fellow  citizens. 
His  views  as  regards  the  National  Church  system  and  Education,  as  regards 
the  Poor  Law,  the  Volunteers  or  the  Co-operativo  movement,  the  teaching 
of  the  Universities  or  the  projects  for  their  Extension  in  other  cities,  were 
all  referable  to  one  drift  of  his  character — a  natural  value  for  an  institution 

6 


68  The  Wm-k  of  Toynbee  Hall. 

or  an  organization  wherever  it  had  grown  up,  a  far  seeing  intuition  as  to 
the  ideal  wltich  it  ought  to  serve  in  the  interests  of  the  common  weal,  and 
an  instinctive  tendency  to  take  his  own  share  as  a  good  citizen  in  its  work. 
I  doubt  whether  this  was  conscious  with  him,  but  it  was  the  same  turn  of 
feeling  that  took  him  into  his  lodging  in  the  East  End,  into  workmen's 
Clubs,  or  to  the  Board  of  Guardians  and  the  Committee  of  the  Charity 
Organization  Society,  which  enlisted  him  in  the  Volunteers,  which  made 
him  compete  for  a  seat  in  his  Town  Council. 

This  appreciation  of  the  influence  and  the  duties  of  practical  citizenship 
was  far  from  being  limited  to  Arnold  Toynbee.  It  was  at  Oxford  a  time  of 
reaction  against  the  facile  theories  of  the  Radicals,  of  irritation  against  the 
cheap  philanthropy  of  "advanced"  views  ending  in  no  sacrifice  of  self;  of 
scepticism  as  to  the  value  of  political  and  social  programmes  which  took  no 
account  of  the  actual  complexities  of  human  life  and  character.  At  the 
suggestion  of  Rev.  S.  A.  Barnett,  a  liberal  London  clergyman  in  an  East  End 
parish,  who  had  many  friends  amongst  us,  a  little  University  Colony  had 
already  been  formed  in  Whitechapel  to  do  something  for  the  poor,  and 
when  we  came  to  discuss  the  nature  of  our  memorial  to  Arnold  Toynbee,  it 
was  natural  with  many  of  us  to  urge  that  a  "  University  Settlement  in  East 
London"  would  be  the  mast  fitting  monument  to  his  memory. 

At  the  time,  however,  the  majority  of  his  friends  dwelt  rather  upon  his 
brief  career  as  au  economist,  and  it  was  decided  to  apply  the  fund  placed  at 
our  disiK).sal,  "  The  Toynbee  Trust,"  to  the  investigation  of  practical  points 
of  Political  Economy.  It  was  arranged  that  in  each  year  a  young  econo- 
mist should  be  appointed  to  spend  the  winter  in  some  selected  industrial 
centre,  giving  lectures  to  the  workmen,  and  simnltaneously  investigating 
some  important  local  feature  of  the  industrial  organization.' 

But  in  that  first  winter  the  whole  heart  of  the  nation  was  stirred  by  the 
revelations  of  the  Pail  Mall  Gazette  as  to  the  lives  of  the  inhabitants  of  the 
metropolis,  the  "  Bitter  Cry  of  Outcast  London."  The  facts  set  forth  were 
neither  new  nor  unknown.  They  were  just  those  with  which  the  clergy  and 
other  workers  in  East  London  were  most  familiar  as  the  daily  burden  of 
their  lives.  But  for  once  they  were  driven  home  into  the  hearts  of  the 
well-to-do,  and  for  a  space  a  great  deal  of  emotion  was  expressed.  The 
newspapers  were  full  of  East  London.  The  air  was  alive  with  schemes  for 
wild  legislation.  High  officials  visited  the  slums  in  person.  The  fashion- 
able world  followed  in  their  footsteps.  "Sanitary  Aid  Committees"  were 
formed  in  every  district  to  enforce  upon  landlords  and  parochial  officials  a 
stricter  observance  of  the  laws  which  should  protect  the  homes  of  the  poor. 
For  the  first  time  the  actual  condition  of  the  people  flashed  upon  the  gen- 
erous feelings  of  the  Universities.    There  were  stirring  debates  at  Oxford 


1  The  subject,  npon  which  reports  have  been  thus  prepared  so  far  are  "Industrial  Arbi- 
tration in  the  Northumberland  Mining  Industries;"  "Economic  Eflecte  of  Mining  Roy- 
alties;" "  Movements  of  Population  amongst  Trades." 


The  Work  of  Toynbee  Hall.  69 

and  Cambridge.  For  the  first  time  men  were  startled  into  a  feeling  of  their 
responsibility  towards  the  toiling  millions  whose  labors  make  possible  the 
academic  life.  Mr.  Barnett  seized  the  moment  to  urge  his  project  of  a 
University  Colony  in  East  London,  where  young  men  who  had  been  touched 
with  sympathy  for  the  lives  of  their  jxwrer  fellow  citizens  might  live  face 
to  face  with  the  actual  conditions  of  crowded  city  life,  study  on  the  spot  the 
evils  and  their  remedies,  and  if  possible  ennoble  the  lives  and  improve  the 
material  condition  of  the  people.  • 

The  tinder  took  fire,  and  in  a  burst  of  general  enthusiasm  the  "  Univer- 
sities Settlement  Association  "  was  formed  to  erect  the  necessary  build- 
ings— Lecture  Rooms  and  Residential  Chambers — and  to  provide  funds  to 
support  the  undertakings  of  the  Residents.  The  motives  of  the  founders 
cannot  be  better  stated  than  in  the  words  of  the  Appeal  which  we  then 
issued. 

"  For  some  years  past  the  momentous  spiritual  and  social  questions  in- 
volved in  the  condition  of  the  poor  have  awakened  an  increasing  interest 
in  our  Universities;  and  the  conviction  has  grown  deeper  that  the  prob- 
lems of  the  future  can  only  be  solved  through  a  more  practical  experience, 
and  a  closer  intimacy  and  sympathy  with  the  poor  themselves. 

"  The  main  difficulty  of  poor  city  neighborhood,  where  the  toilers  who 
create  our  national  prosperity  are  massed  apart,  is  that  they  have  few 
friends  and  helpers  who  c-an  study  and  relieve  their  difficulties,  few  points 
of  contact  with  tiie  best  thoughts  and  aspirations  of  their  age,  few  educated 
public-spirited  residents,  such  as  elsewhere  in  England  uphold  the  tone  of 
Local  Life  and  enforce  the  efficiency  of  Local  Self-Government.  In  the 
relays  of  men  coming  year  by  year  from  the  Universities  into  London  to 
study  for  professions  or  to  pursue  their  independent  interests,  there  are 
many,  free  from  the  ties  of  later  life,  who  might  fitly  choose  themselves  to 
live  amongst  the  poor,  to  give  up  to  them  a  portion  of  their  lives,  and 
endeavor  to  fill  this  social  void.  The  universal  testimony  of  those  best 
acquainted  with  the  squalor  and  degradation  to  which  attention  has  been 
lately  directed,  affirms  that  there  is  less  need  of  new  legislation  than  of 
citizens  who  will  maintain  the  existing  law  and  create  a  public  opinion 
amongst  the  {>oor  tliemselves.  Upon  the  Vestries,  upon  the  Boards  of 
Guardians,  upon  the  Committees  of  Schools  and  of  every  public  undertak- 
ing, educated  men  may  find  the  opportunity  of  serving  the  interests  of 
their  neighbors:  or  even  if  such  direct  responsibilities  cannot  be  assumed, 
they  may  help  to  create  amongst  their  fellow-citizens  the  public  opinion 
which  insists  on  good  administration.  University  men  have  already 
approached  the  Higher  Education  of  the  working  classes  in  the  Univer- 
sity Extension  Scheme  and  institutions  with  similar  aims.  The  results 
have  been  most  encouraging.  The  time  has  come  for  a  far  wider  develop- 
ment. Art  and  Industrial  Exhibitions  have  to  be  organized  at  the  doors 
of  the  poor,  and,  what  is  more  important,  explained  sympathetically  to  the 
throngs  ready  to  visit  them.     Co-operative  Societies  have  to  be  formed, 


60  Tlie  Work  of  Toynbee  Hall. 

their  principles  established,  and  their  wider  issues  developed.  Other 
helpers  are  wanted  for  the  work  of  the  Charity  Organization  and  Sanitary 
Aid  Committees,  for  the  organization  of  Clubs,  Kxcursions,  Childrens' 
Country  Holidays,  Concerts,  and  for  every  kind  of  Entertainment  in  which 
the  culture  born  of  ease  may  be  shared  with  the  toiling  population. 

"It  is  the  object  of  the  'Universities'  Settlement'  to  link  the  Univer- 
sities with  East  London,  and  to  direct  the  human  sympathies,  the  ener- 
gies, and  the  public  spirk  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge  to  the  actual  conditions 
of  town  life.  During  the  last  few  years  many  University  men,  following  in 
the  steps  of  Denison  and  Arnold  Toynbee,  have,  on  leaving  the  Univer- 
sities for  London,  energetically  responded  to  the  varied  calls  for  their  aid. 
Such  isolated  efforts  are  capable  of  infinite  expansion  were  the  way  once 
laid  open,  and  it  is  now  proposed  to  offer  to  those  who  are  ready  a  channel 
of  immediate  and  useful  activity  and  a  centre  of  right  living.  In  a  common 
life  united  by  a  common  devotion  to  the  welfare  of  the  poor,  those  fellow- 
workers  who  are  able  to  give  either  their  whole  time  or  the  leisure  which 
they  can  spare  from  their  occupations,  will  find,  it  is  believed,  a  support  in 
the  pursuit  of  their  own  highest  aims  as  well  as  a  practical  guidance  which 
isolated  and  inexperienced  philanthropists  must  lack." 

The  residents  (who  live  at  their  own  charges)'  have,  by  this  time,  under 
the  general  direction  of  Mr.  Barnett,  turned  into  fact  many  of  the  projects 
thus  set  before  them.  Upwards  of  50  men  have  made  their  home  for  a 
time  at  Toynbee  Hall,  many  having  now  gone  on  to  their  life  work,  richer 
in  social  experience  and  wider  in  human  sympathy.  The  places  of  those 
who  have  left  have  been  filled  again  and  again,  and  the  Chambers  are 
generally  occupied.  Around  the  Residents  a  body  of  about  100  "Associ- 
ates" have  gsithered  whose  homes  lie  elsewhere,  but  who  co-operate  with 
the  residents  in  their  undertakings,  while  the  Guest  rooms  have  afforded 
a  temporary  hospitality  to  constant  relays  of  friends.  Graduates  and  Under- 
graduates, who  come  to  help  or  to  learn  for  a  few  days  at  a  time.  Indeed 
the  "Settlement"  tends  more  and  more  to  become  a  house  of  call  for  earnest 
men  of  all  classes,  drawn  thither  by  their  work,  their  enquiries,  their  friend- 
ships, or  invited  for  the  particular  discussion  of  some  social  problem. 

One  object  at  least  of  the  founders  of  the  Association  has  been  thus 
attained  in  the  intercourse  established  between  the  life  of  our  Universities 
and  the  life  of  our  Jkst  End  citizens.  Meanwhile  Toynbee  Hall  has 
already  succeeded  in  making  its  influence  widely  felt  among  the  crowded 
population  in  whose  midst  it  is  placed.  By  the  working  classes  of  Esist 
London  it  is  raf)idly  being  accepted  as  the  visible  embodiment  of  the 
almost  legendary  life  and  culture  of  the  old  Universities. 

It  would  take  too  long  to  enumerate  in  detail  all  the  educational  and 


iThe  Rentals  paid  by  them  rary  according  to  accommodation.  They  average  about  £1 
weelciy.  The  arranxeruents  for  KoanI  and  tService  are  managed  by  a  Committee  of  ibe 
Itesidrnta  and  amount  lu  about  25  shillings  a  weeic  more. 


The  Work  of  Toynbee  Hall.  61 

social  work  in  which  the  residents  are  engaged.  They  themselves  possibly 
would  feel  they  had  won  success  in  the  degree  to  which  tliey  had  kindled 
locjil  opinion  and  enlisted  in  every  kind  of  public  undertaking  the  inde- 
pendent co-operation  of  their  neighbors.  The  residents  would  judge  them- 
selves not  so  much  by  what  they  do,  as  by  what  they  establish  ;  not  by  the 
results  which  they  could  report,  as  by  the  spirit  they  have  engendered.  It 
is  not,  we  believe,  through  external  interference,  but  through  the  develop- 
ment of  individual  character,  through  the  kindling  of  local  opinion,  through 
the  education  of  civic  spirit,  and  the  direction  of  local  energies,  that  ground 
can  be  permanently  gained.  In  a  democratic  country  nothing  can  be  firmly 
achieved  except  through  the  masses  of  the  people.  Legislation  may  strike 
off  the  shackles  of  evil  custom,  and  may  supply  methods  of  action,  but  when 
the  people  is  enthroned,  it  is  impossible  to  establish  permanently  a  higher 
political  life,  or  a  more  perfect  social  organization  than  the  people  crave 
for.  Every  social  question  has  thus  a  moral  question  behind.  Apathy,  iso- 
lation, ignorance,  selfishness  in  the  masses — these  are  the  powers  of  resist- 
ance to  be  vanquished  before,  by  any  chance,  a  self-governed  people  can 
possibly  come  to  be  a  well-governed  people. 

It  is  not  therefore  so  much  by  what  they  have  done  that  the  residents 
would  count  their  days,  as  by  what  they  may  have  led  others  to  do.  Has 
any  one,  coming  to  Toynbee  Hall  whether  as  boy  or  man,  as  a  student,  as 
a  guest,  or  as  a  coadjutor  in  some  social  undertaking,  gained  an  idea  or  a 
method,  a  belief,  a  sympathy  or  a  principle  which  will  take  its  own  root  in 
him  and  bring  forth  fruit  for  others'  service?  Has  any  one  coming  from 
East  London  or  West  become  inspired  with  a  higher  sense  of  personal  and 
civic  duty,  with  a  fuller  faith  of  what  can  be  attained  by  the  fellow-service 
of  fellow-citizens,  and  by  an  insight  into  the  possibilities  and  the  methods 
of  social  co-operation?  Above  all,  has  any  one  coming  to  Toynbee  Hall, 
whether  rich  or  poor,  found  there  new  sympathies,  interests,  and  friend- 
ships, and  left  it  with  his  old  sense  of  class  distinctions,  class  prejudices, 
and  class  antagonisms  effaced,  in  a  deeper  conviction  of  human  brotherhood 
and  in  the  acknowledgment  of  a  common  responsibility  for  the  common 
good? 

Such  at  least  would  be  our  hope.  How  far  realized  we  cannot  judge. 
"NVe  can  only  indicate  a  few  of  the  tangible  undertakings  which  have  begun 
to  take  root  at  Toynbee  Hall. 

Mot  only  has  the  Hall  become  the  centre  of  educational  effort  and  social 
life  in  Whitechapel,  but  its  members  have  gone  out  to  take  their  share  in 
tlie  local  government  of  tlie  district  and  in  all  the  various  forms  of  public 
work,  to  wliich  the  manifold  needs  of  a  poor,  populous,  and  neglected  neigh- 
borhood give  occasion. 

The  public  rooms  of  the  Hall  have  become  an  arena  for  the  discussion  of 
every  kind  of  view,  and  a  meeting  place  for  every  class.  They  have  also 
been  made  a  social  centre  for  every  branch  of  East  End  lite  and  work,  where 
our  hospitalities  have  been  extended  to  co-operators,  workmen's  clubs  of  all 


62  The  Work  of  Toynbee  HaU. 

kinds,  students  of  every  degree,  elementary  teachers  and  the  representatives 
of  every  social  movement  amongst  the  people  around.  It  is  no  exaggeration 
to  say  that  many  tliousjinds  of  our  poorer  fellow-citizens,  to  whom  Toynbee 
Hall  was  dedicated  by  the  Universities  lour  years  ago,  have  found  recreation 
and  benefit  in  the  rooms  established  for  their  use  and  entertainment. 

On  the  educational  side  Toynbee  Hall  has  been  made  the  most  prominent 
centre  of  "  University  Extension"  in  East  London.  A  free  students'  library 
has  been  built  and  filled  with  books  and  readers,  lectures  and  reading  clubs 
ranging  over  the  most  varied  subjects  of  moral,  literary  and  scientific  inter- 
est have  been  instituted.  Technical  classes  have  been  established,  musical 
societies  have  been  formed,  and  above  all  the  elementary  schoolmasters  and 
pupil  teachers  of  the  neighborhood,  upon  whom  depends  the  future  of  the 
rising  generation  of  citizens,  have  been  welcomed  to  the  society  and  the 
educational  advantages  of  the  Hall. 

The  educational  associations  which  have  gathered  around  us,  besides 
promoting  knowledge  and  developing  intellectual  interest,  have  created  a 
spirit  of  comradeship  among  the  students,  inspiring  them  with  a  healthy 
sense  of  being  fellow  laborers  in  a  great  cause.  Some  of  the  most  zealous 
local  students,  who  are  already  more  or  less  at  home  in  Toynbee  Hall,  have 
taken  up  residence  under  academic  discipline  in  "  Wadham  House,"  an 
adjacent  building  provided  for  the  purpose  by  residents  and  their  friends. 
Earning  their  living  during  the  day,  in  the  evening  they  pursue  their 
studies  in  connection  with  our  varied  educational  classes,  and  also  take  their 
part  in  its  social  work.  The  home  thus  ofiered  to  men  who  have  to  make 
their  own  fight  for  each  step  in  self-improvement,  introduces  into  the  heart 
of  East  London  the  elements  of  an  intellectual  society,  and  it  promises  to 
form  an  indejiendent  centre  of  energetic  practical  citizenship. 

It  may  afford  some  insight  into  the  magnitude  and  variety  of  the  claims 
made  upon  the  time  and  energy  of  the  inmates  of  Toynbee  Hall,  to  give  a 
summary  of  the  work  done  by  one  of  their  number,  though  most  of  them 
have  their  own  employments  which  limit  their  energies  within  bounds 
somewhat  more  circumscribed.  Besides  conducting  a  class  of  University 
Extension  Students  in  popular  Ethics,  another  of  I'upil-teachers  in  English 
Literature,  a  class  of  workingmen  in  1  olitical  Economy,  and  a  Sunday  Bible 
Class  of  members  of  the  St.  Jude's  Juvenile  Association,  the  resident  in 
question  acted  as  Secretary  to  one  of  the  Local  Committees  of  the  Charity 
Organization  Society,  as  Secretary  to  a  Ward  Sanitary  Aid  Committee,  as 
a  School  Board  Manager,  and  finally  as  a  member  of  the  Board  of  Guardi- 
ans. In  each  of  these  capacities  he  found  new  fields  of  work  opening  out 
before  him.  The  Political  Economy  Class  served  as  the  nucleus  of  a  body 
of  workmen,  who,  as  members  of  relief  committees  and  as  managers  of  the 
newly-started  Recreative  P>ening  Classes  in  Board  Schools,  have  begim  to 
do  excellent  service  in  charitable  and  educational  administration,  and  have 
thns  given  practical  evidence  of  the  possibility  of  developing  among  the 
artisans  of  East  London  that  spirit  of  citizenship— a  very  different  thing 


The  Work  of  Toynhfc  Hall.  63 

from  political  partizanship — which  it  should  be  the  object  of  all  true 
reformers  to  call  into  existence  among  the  body  of  the  people.  In  addition 
to  these  numerous  undertakings,  in  all  of  which  his  efforts  have  been 
directed  to  evoking  the  co-operation  of  the  people  themselves,  the  resident 
in  question  has  found  time  to  devote  many  evenings  to  a  boys'  club,  where 
boxing  and  single-stick  have  been  substituted  for  mere  horse-play  with 
excellent  effect  upon  the  conduct  and  bearing  of  the  lads.  He  has  also 
taken  a  part  in  organizing  foot-ball  among  the  Board  Schools  of  the  district. 

Records  of  similar,  though  in  each  case  individual  and  distinctive,  activity 
might  be  given  with  respect  to  other  residents,  but  it  is  only  possible  to 
notice  some  of  the  principal  results.  The  "  Whittington,"  a  club  and  home 
for  street  boys,  was  opened  in  1885  by  Prince  Edward  of  Wales.  It  has 
done  much  useful  work,  and  a  cadet  corps  of  Volunteers  has  been  formed 
there.  An  effort  has  been  made  to  unite  the  boy  pupil-teachers  of  all  the 
London  Elementary  Schools  into  one  community,  and  by  the  agencies  of 
cricket,  rowing,  and  debating  clubs,  to  kindle  amongst  them  that  esprit  de 
corps  which  so  strengthens  the  morale  of  our  higher  public  schools.  Numer- 
ous classes  for  pupil-teachers  are  conducted  by  members  of  the  Hall,  in  all 
of  which  the  object  kept  in  view  is  not  so  much  to  increase  the  information 
of  the  already  over-crammed,  as  to  quicken  their  intellectual  interest  and 
widen  their  sympathies. 

The  Sanitary  Aid  Committee,  which  has  its  head-quarters  at  Toynbee 
Hall,  has  resulted  not  only  in  the  removal  of  a  number  of  specific  nuisances, 
but  in  greater  vigilance  both  on  the  part  of  the  landlords  and  of  the  local 
autliorities  with  regard  to  the  condition  of  tenement  houses.  The  oppor- 
tunity which  the  visitors  gain  of  becoming  acquainted  with  the  lives  of  the 
people  and  of  entering  into  friendly  relations  with  them  is  a  secondary  but 
valuable  result. 

Such  are  some  of  the  undertakings  which  now  centre  round  Toynbee 
Hall.  It  is  an  enterprise  which  if  patiently  and  loyally  maintained  and 
effectively  developed  cannot  but  beget  experience  which  will  react  most 
practically  upon  the  thought  of  the  educated  classes  on  whom  in  a  demo- 
cratic country  falls  so  deep  a  responsibility  for  local  and  central  good  gov- 
ernment. The  present  residents  at  Toynbee  Hall  are  we  hope  the  pioneers 
of  a  permanent  movement  re-establishing  amongst  the  leisured  classes  the 
sense  of  their  civic  obligations.  In  the  meetings  which  are  held  in  the 
various  Colleges  in  support  of  the  work,  the  interest  of  the  undergraduates 
is  attracted  to  the  social  questions  which  confront  their  representatives  in 
Whitechapel,  and  seed  is  sown  which  will  bear  fruit  in  years  to  come,  when 
the  undergraduates  of  to-day  become  the  administrators,  the  landlords,  the 
journalists,  the  law  makers,  the  public  opinion  of  their  time.  Later  as 
these  undergraduates  leave  the  university,  Toynbee  Hall  offers  to  all  an 
opportunity  of  direct  personal  experience  of  social  problems,  and  a  channel 
for  the  expression  of  every  social  sympathy.  These  are  among  tlie  advan- 
tages with  which  the  movement  has  endowed  the  Universities.    Yet  on  the 


64  ,  The  Work  of  Toynbee  HaU. 

other  side  we  are  glad  to  realize  how  much  tangible  good  our  fellow  citizens 
have  reaped  in  education,  in  enlightenment,  in  social  stimulus,  in  the 
development  of  local  life  and  the  reform  of  local  evils.  The  principle  of 
personal  service,  personal  knowledge  and  personal  sympathy  remains  the 
key-note  of  every  endeavor.  On  each  side  men  have  learnt  to  appreciate 
each  other  better,  and  many  a  link  of  cordial  and  deep-rooted  friendship, 
based  on  common  tastes,  common  associations  and  common  work  for  others' 
good,  now  binds  together  classes  which  had  otherwise  been  strangers,  and 
possibly  antagonists. 

Phimp  Lyttelton  Gexl,  M.  A., 
Chairman  of  (ht  Oouncil. 
Clarendon  JPtesa  and  Bcdliol  College,  Oxford. 


THE  NEIGHBORHOOD  GUILD  IN  NEW  YORK. 
By  Chaeles  B.  Stovek,  A.  B. 

An  apology  for  appending  to  the  foregoing  narrative  of  the  splendid 
achievements  of  Toynbee  Hall  an  accx)unt  of  the  small  doings  of  the 
Neighborhood  Guild  is  supplied  first,  by  tiie  fact,  that  in  some  measure 
the  descent  of  the  Neighborhood  Guild  is  traceable  to  Toynbee  Hall,  and 
secondly,  by  the  endeavors  of  the  Guild  to  become  the  Toynbee  Hall  of 
New  York  City. 

The  Neighborhood  Guild  was  founded  by  Mr.  Stanton  Coit  early  in  1887, 
at  146  Forsyth  St.,  New  York.  After  a  residence  of  several  weeks  among 
the  tenement-house  people,  face  to  face  with  the  great  problems  presented 
by  their  lives,  Mr.  Ck)it  began  his  work  of  reform  in  a  tentative  manner,  by 
inviting  to  his  own  cheerful  apartments  a  club  of  half  a  dozen  boys,  who 
had  been  meeting  in  the  dismal  room  of  a  poor  old  blind  woman.  These 
boys  brought  in  others,  and  soon  Mr.  Coit  felt  encouraged  to  rent  the  base- 
ment of  the  tenement,  in  which  he  lived,  for  a  club-room.  Here  the  boys, 
or  young  men,  their  average  age  being  eighteen  years,  were  organized  into 
a  club.  And  afterwards,  as  the  necessary  volunteer  workers  were  secured, 
three  other  clubs  were  formed,  one  consisting  of  young  women,  another  of 
little  boys,  and  the  last,  of  little  girls.  A  kindergarten  also  was  established 
at  an  early  date.  These  various  organized  bodies  of  young  people  together 
form  the  Neighborhood  Guild.  Its  motto  is:  "  Order  ia  our  Basis;  Improve- 
ment our  Aim;  and  Friendship  our  Principle." 

In  the  second  year  of  the  Guild's  history,  the  formation  of  a  similar  set 
of  clubs  was  undertaken  in  Cherry  St.,  and  now  is  being  carried  on  with 
such  ease  that  our  castles  in  the  air  become  less  insubstantial,  and  our 
hope  grows  firmer  that  the  Guild  may  multiply  its  clubs  on  all  sides,  until, 
let  us  say,  they  shall  be  found  in  every  election-district  of  our  city  ward. 
Then,  when  the  whole  people  shall  be  organized  for  reform,  when  all  the 
latent  love  of  the  beautiful  and  the  right  which  the  coarseness  of  tenement- 
house  life  and  the  cares  of  poverty  blast  and  make  unfruitful,  shall  be 
stirred  up  and  developed  by  extensive  cooperation  for  individual  and  social 
progress,  then  shall  the  workers  for  righteousness  strive  to  some  purpose. 
But  now  the  workers  of  iniquity  flourish.  The  poor  people  of  our  district 
are  represented  in  the  State  Assembly  by  one  of  the  most  notorious  scamps 
in  the  history  of  New  York  politics, — a  saloon-keeper,  a  gambler,  a  friend 
of  "crooks"  and  a  tool  of  lobbyists.  Four  times  in  succession  this  law- 
breaker has  been  elected  a  law-maker  of  the  State  of  New  York.  "He 
6  65 


66  The  Neigliborhood  Guild  in  New  York. 

knows  every  man,  woman,  and  child  in  the  ward."  There  is  the  secret  of 
his  power.  So  says  one  of  his  "  iieelers."  Verily  the  children  of  thb  world 
are  wiser  in  their  methods  of  work  than  the  children  of  light. 

Thus  to  organize  the  young  people  into  numerous  clubs  is  to  take  advan- 
tage of  their  social  instinct  which,  in  our  tenement-house  district,  is  already 
finding  its  gratification  in  countless  "  Pleasure  Clubs,"  the  height  of  whose 
ambition  is  a  chowder-party  in  summer  and  a  ball  in  winter.  These 
Pleasure  Clubs  encourage  lavish  expenditure  of  small  earnings,  vulgarize 
the  tastes,  and  readily  become  centres  of  politicstl  jobbery.  The  Neighbor- 
hood Guild  Clubs  are  designed  to  encourage  thrift  and  fellow-helpfulness, 
to  purify  and  exalt  the  tiistes,  to  excite  opposition  to  all  forms  of  injustice, 
and  to  kindle  devotion  to  the  common  weal. 

I  shall  write  but  briefly  of  the  Guild's  forms  of  entertainment  and  educa- 
tion, which  for  the  most  part  are  those  employed  at  Toynbee  Hall  and  in 
the  "Annexes"  of  modern  churches;  and  then  more  fully  of  the  Guild  as 
a  College  or  University  Settlement.  Kach  club  meets  twice  a  week.  In  the 
older  clubs  one-fourth  of  the  income  from  the  weekly  fee  of  ten  cents  is 
spent  for  the  relief  of  the  sick  and  the  poor.  It  is  our  endeavor  also  to 
have  the  clubs  bear  a  portion  of  the  exijense  of  practical  reforms.  They 
bore  one-third  of  the  cxpent^^e  of  keeping  our  street  clean  during  the  summer 
The  Kindergarten,  in  charge  of  two  well-trained  teachers,  gleams  like  a 
fairy-land  amid  tlie  gloomy  and  depressing  tenements.  Of  the  fifty  children 
in  attendance  at  the  close  of  lat.t  session,  but  three  are  in  this  year's  class. 
This  may  be  largely  ascribed  to  the  removal  of  families,  which  anicmg  the 
poor  of  the  city  so  often  interrupts  gootl  influences.  The  untamed  small 
boys,  though  long  subjected  to  our  strongest  subduing  forces,  are  still  sadly 
prone  to  remind  us,  that  for  them,  to  be  noisy  is  to  be  happy.  They  tire  of 
every  game  but  baseball.  The  ]>iano  and  song  are  great  aids  to  composing 
their  wild  spirits.  The  chief  instruction  given  the  two  girls'  clubs  is  in 
housewifely  duties.  The  lar;^er  girls  have  been  carefully  trained  in  hand- 
sewing,  including  the  art  of  fine  embroidery.  Several  times  they  have 
cooperated  with  the  young  men's  club  in  getting  up  musical,  literary,  and 
theatrical  entertainments.  The  young  men  have  received  the  most  varied 
instruction,  embracing  clay-modelliiig,  wood-carving,  debating,  public  decla- 
mation, parliamentary  practice,  singing,  drawing,  gymnastic  and  military 
drilling.  Numerous  desultory  lectures  have  been  delivered.  At  present  a 
somewhat  systematic  efl^ort  is  being  made  to  give  them  a  grasp  of  the  lead- 
ing phases  of  the  world's  history.  Several  classes  in  elementary  studies 
have  been  formed. 

Our  "  Dancing  Evening,"  for  a  while  weekly,  then,  as  our  more  serious 
work  increased,  semi-monthly,  is  to  be  reckoned  among  the  educational,  as 
well  as  among  the  entertaining,  meetings  of  the  Guild.  Only  an  ignorant 
fanatic  coulil  say  that  by  permitting  the  young  men  and  the  young  women 
to  dance  together,  we  are  training  them  for  the  Bowery  dance-halls.  People 
of  common  sense,  with  no  slight  disapproval  of  dancing,  have  come  here 


The  Neighborhood  Guild  in  New  York.  67 

and  for  a  long  -while  observed  its  effects  upon  these  young  people,  and  now 
unhesitatingly  declare  that  these  social  meetings,  always  under  the  super- 
vision of  some  of  the  Guild's  workers,  have  proved  a  school  of  graceful, 
modest,  and  chivalrous  manners,  all  the  corrupting  influences  of  dance-hall 
and  fashionable  ball  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 

In  the  summer-time,  to  a  limited  extent  the  clubs  leave  the  city  for  a 
breath  of  fresh  air.  The  little  girls,  in  several  parties,  spent  a  week  at  the 
country  home  of  their  teacher.  Very  generous  invitations  were  extended 
to  the  young  women's  club  to  spend  a  week  or  more  at  the  sea-shore,  and  to 
the  young  men's  club  to  summer  in  the  Catskills ;  but  not  one  of  the  young 
men  could  leave  the  city,  and  only  three  of  the  young  women  could  go  away, 
chiefly  because  their  employers  would  not  grant  them  leave  of  absence. 
Several  excursions  of  a  day  have  been  made  by  two  or  more  of  the  clubs  to 
the  shores  of  Staten  Island,  where  bathing,  boating,  and  athletic  sports 
afforded  grateful  recreation. 

The  work  of  the  Guild,  as  thus  outlined,  is  carried  on  in  the  main  by 
volunteer  workers,  who  in  this  second  year  of  the  Guild's  history  numbered 
twenty-two,  one-half  ladies  and  one-half  gentlemen.  Of  these  workers  the 
great  majority  are  up-town  residents,  who  come  to  the  Guild  an  evening  or 
two  every  week.  They  bring  with  them  gentleness,  kindness,  culture, 
knowledge,  a  rich  store  of  human  sympathy,  and  open  eyes  to  discern  the 
signs  of  the  times.  These  are  some  of  the  strands  which  help  to  bridge 
over  that  angry  flood  of  passions  which  is  ever  tending  to  sweep  the  social 
classes  farther  apart.  The  Guild  is  not  tainted  with  fashionable  "slum- 
ming." A  little  of  its  work  has  been  done  up  town.  One  lady  in  her  own 
liome  instructed  a  young  man  in  piano-playing  and  singing;  another  in  her 
own  home  instructed  a  girl  in  embroidering;  and  still  another  gave  lessons 
in  wood-carving  to  three  young  men.  Would  there  were  more  such  inter- 
course between  up-town  people  and  tenement-house  people !  The  Guild 
aims  to  be  a  mediator  between  the  cultured  and  the  uncultured,  between 
the  gifted  and  the  ungifted.  Ye  that  have  talents,  why  not  impart  to 
him  that  has  none?  What  a  university  might  be  established  in  this  city, 
its  curriculum  perhaps  not  as  varied  as  that  of  a  regular  university,  but 
possessing  an  unrivalled  endowment  of  saving  social  forces,  if  a  thousand 
young  men  and  women  from  the  tenement-houses  were  welcomed  weekly 
into  as  many  different  homes  of  the  up-town  people,  there  to  receive  some 
acquirement  from  more  gifted  fellow-creatures  I 

The  Guild's  most  distinctive  feature  is  found  in  its  College  men,  resident 
together  in  a  tenement-house.  Of  these  there  have  been  five, — Mr.  Stanton 
Coit,  Ph.  D.  (Berlin  Univ.),  Mr.  E.  S.  Forbes,  and  Mr.  W.  B.  Thorp,  all 
Amherst  graduates;  Mr.  M.  I.  Swift,  Ph.  D.  (Johns  Hopkins  University), 
a  Williams  graduate,  and  the  writer,  a  Lafayette  graduate.  Three  of  these 
men  have  been  students  at  the  University  of  Berlin.  Mr.  Coit,  during  his 
student  life  abroad,  became  well  acquainted  with  Toynbee  Hall,  where  he 
was  enriched  with  new  ideas  and  impulses.    However,  his  prime  endeavor 


6ft  The  Neighborhood  Ouild  in  New  York. 

here  seems  to  have  been  not  to  model  the  Guild  after  Tm-nbee  Hall,  viewed 
as  a  University  Settlement,  but  railier,  in  accordance  with  liis  own  etliical 
system,  so  to  organize  the  people  around  the  family,  as  tiie  unit,  as  to  origi- 
nate forces  of  social  regeneration.  This  organization  has  not  extended  to 
the  parents.  In  describing  his  work  among  the  young,  Mr.  Coit  has  said 
tliat  he  reM)lved  to  do  for  them,  what  parents  of  wealth  and  leisure  would 
do  for  their  children.  Also  another  Guild  resident  came  in  contact  with 
Toynbee  Hall  while  abroad,  and,  at  the  first  moment  of  his  acquaintance 
with  the  Guild,  became  attached  to  it  by  the  expectation  of  its  becoming 
another  Toynbee  Hall.  I  well  remember  when  in  May,  1887,  I  asked 
Mr.  Coit  whether  such  might  not  be  the  development  of  the  Guild,  he 
replie<l,  "Will  you  help  to  make  it  a  Toynbee  Hall."  He  made  special 
trips  to  Amiierst  and  Johns  Hopkins  to  enlist  men  in  the  movement.  Mr. 
Swift,  for  whom  the  idea  of  a  People's  University  had  great  attractions, 
helped  along  the  Toynbee  Hall  movement  here  by  his  successful  man.age- 
ment  of  a  Social  Science  Club,  in  which,  to  a  limited  extent,  workingmen 
were  brought  in  contact  with  University  men. 

Let  us  notice  some  of  the  reasons  for  developing  the  Neighborhood  Guild 
into  a  Toynbee  Hall.  First.  There  is  a  numerous  class  of  educated  young 
men,  who  are  deeply  interested  in  the  social  problems  of  to-day,  their  sympa- 
thies for  human  suffering  the  warmest,  who  yet  would  be  hampered,  if  put 
in  ecclesiastical  leading-strings.  Such  would  find  a  field  of  labor  in  a 
Toynbee  Hall.  Let  it  not  be  thought,  that  I  presume  to  speak  to  the  dis- 
credit of  the  Church.  I  am  regarding  her  conservatism  in  methods  of  work 
simply  as  a  matter  of  fact,  which  exercises  a  decided  influence  over  the 
career  of  many  a  young  man.  I  know  that  one,  inspired  by  the  love  of  Christ 
and  his  fellowmen,  applied  for  work  to  a  person  in  authority  in  city  evan- 
gelization, and  was  dismisi>ed  with  tlie  rash  words :  "  The  Lord  God  has  no 
work  for  you  to  do ; "  because,  forsooth,  his  theology  seemed  "  wishy-washy  " 
to  the  rigid  dogmatist.  Such  a  young  man  is  welcome  here.  Not  because 
the  Guild  has  a  liking  for  vague  theology,  but  because  it  believes  that  this 
world  is  too  badly  off  to  afford  to  let  a  single  spark  of  enthusiasm  for 
humanity  be  quenched. 

Further,  a  Toynbee  Hall  could  easily  approach  the  workingman,  who  is 
now  estranged  from  the  Church.  Ex-Pres.  McCosh  has  lately  said  that 
when  he  first  visited  our  country,  he  was  often  asked,  "  What  do  you  think 
of  our  congregations?"  and  he  answered,  "I  think  much  of  them,  but 
where  are  your  lal)oring  classes?"  and  he  adds,  "Where  is  the  laboring 
man  in  our  Churches?  is  the  question  I  am  still  putting,  seeking  an  answer." 
It  should  also  be  noticed  that  the  Church  is  much  estranged  from  the  tene- 
ment-house districts.  As  the  Church  is  doing  very  little  for  the  down-town 
people,  a  University  Settlement  would  here  find  a  large  field  of  labor.  These 
people  should  not  be  utterly  forsaken.  According  to  the  New  York  "City 
Mission  Monthly,"  in  our  ward,  the  10th,  the  population  is  47,554,  and  the 
number  of  churches  and  chapels,  five.    And  according  to  Dr.  Josiah  Strong, 


The  Neighborhood  Guild  in  New  York.  69 

while  the  increase  in  tlie  population  of  New  York  City,  since  1880,  was 
300,000,  the  increase  in  the  number  of  churches,  during  the  same  period, 
was  only  four.  I  do  not  wish  to  imply  that  a  Toynbee  Hall  would  be  a 
complete  substitute  for  the  vanished  churches;  but  would  anyone  deter 
another  from  pouring  balm  upon  a  cut  finger,  because  there  is  no  surgeon 
at  hand  to  remove  some  internal  cancer?  So  I  believe  in  this  University 
movement,  because  it  does  beneflt  men.  How  far  it  fulls  short  of  blessing 
and  regenerating  the  entire  man  does  not  enter  into  consideration  now. 
Tnis  is  the  Guild's  relation  to  the  Christian  Church.  Never,  not  even  when 
Mr.  Coit  was  here,  was  the  Guild  antagonistic  to  the  Church.  I  say,  not 
even  when  Mr.  Coit  was  here ;  for  his  late  position,  as  Assistant  Lecturer 
to  the  New  York  Society  for  Ethical  Culture,  seems  to  have  created,  in  some 
minds,  the  impression  that  this  Guild  is  a  work  of  that  Society,  and  that  the 
spirit  of  Ethical  Culture,  with  its  pronounced  repudiation  of  all  theology, 
rules  in  the  Guild.  These  notions  are  utterly  false.  The  personal  help  of 
Christians  in  the  Clubs  was  always  welcomed  by  Mr.  Coit;  and  we  have 
even  been  scrupulous  enough  to  hold  all  our  meetings  on  week-days,  that 
on  Sunday  no  member  of  the  Clubs  might  be  withdrawn  from  attendance 
on  Sunday  School  or  Church. 

Further,  various  educational,  sanitary,  social,  and  political  reforms  could  be 
undertaken  by  a  Toynbee  Hall  with  fewer  restraints  than  they  could  by  the 
Church.  Certainly  in  political  action  it  could  engage  with  a  freedom  to 
which  the  Church  is  a  stranger.  From  a  Toynbee  Hall  might  proceed  a 
thorough  purification  of  this  sink  of  political  corruption.  Persons  resident 
here  would  acquire  that  familiarity  with  the  men  and  the  afiairs  of  the 
district  which  is  so  necessary  for  a  successful  reform  movement.  Our  local 
"boss"  says:  "We  will  not  allow  the  residents  of  Murray  Hill  to  dictate 
to  us,"  May  the  time  come  when  a  large  band  of  intelligent,  fearless,  and 
public-spirited  young  men,  residents  here,  shall  labor  perseveringly  for  the 
purity  of  the  ballot  and  the  dethronement  of  the  corrupt  "  bosses ! " 

Something  may  be  said  also  in  favor  of  such  a  University  Settlement 
from  a  purely  intellectual  point  of  view.  That  the  University-bred  mind 
would  itself  be  profited  by  frequent  contact  with  the  masses  of  a  great  city 
no  one  doubts.  But  very  generally  it  is  supposed  that  the  University-bred 
mind  is  altogether  unsuited  to  instruct  and  inspire  the  masses.  I  remember 
that  once  in  a  Social  Science  Club,  made  up,  according  to  the  Club's  par- 
lance, oi  prolelaires  and  professors,  a  University  man,  having  alluded  to  the 
difficulty,  which  a  person  like  himself  has  in  reaching  the  understanding 
of  the  people,  a  workingman  remarked, — "I  once  heard  Huxley  lecture 
and  had  no  difficulty  in  understanding  him."  Does  the  multitude  have 
any  difficulty  in  understanding  the  political  addresses  of  our  leading 
lawyers  and  statesmen?  Is  the  popular  mind  capable  of  grasping  only 
the  platitudes  of  pettifoggers?  Why  is  it  that  in  New  York  City  the  ablest 
and  most  attractive  preachers  are  in  the  pulpits  of  the  rich?  If  Christ  and  St. 
Paul  were  here,  would  they  confine  their  preaching  to  wealthy  churches,  and 


70  The  Neighborhood  Guild  in  New  York. 

think  the  poor  of  the  tenements  quite  incapable  of  appreciating  their  ser- 
mons? I  dare  say  that  the  most  powerful  and  popular  of  the  preachers  to 
men  of  weallli  and  culture  could,  with  little  eflbrt,  render  themselves  both 
powerful  and  popular  in  the  slums.  Let  not  the  University  men  be  misled 
by  tiie  foibles  of  the  Church.  A  great  work  can  be  done  by  them  right  in 
the  heart  of  the  tenements.  That  the  intellectual  barriers  to  their  success 
can  be  overcome,  the  story  of  Toynbee  Hall  amply  testifies. 

May  this  monograph  concerning  Arnold  Toynbee  and  the  accompanying 
sketch  of  the  work  of  Toynbee  Uall  iacite  uiany  on  Americau  student  to  a 
similar  work  in  his  own  land  I 


103 


m 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 

BELOW. 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  UBRABY  FAOUTY 

llllllllll    III    III    II  III  III! 


ill   III   II  III  I  ill    ill 

A     000  683  677     9 


